UNIVERSITY  OF  CAl  IFORNIA    SAN  DIEGO 


3  1822  00544  1035 


UBI^ARY 

CALIfOftNU 

5*N  DIEGO 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CA 

rfiW'  111 !  ■ 


3  1822  00544  1035 


7^7 


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/<^<J  " 


ABOUT     PARIS 


RICHARD    HARDING   DAVIS 


ILLUSTRATED 


CHARLES   DANA   GIBSON 


NEW     YORK 

HARPER  &   BROTHERS   PUBLISHERS 

1S95 


By  RICHARD  HARDING  DAVIS. 


OUR  ENGLISH  COUSINS.     Illustrated.     Post  8vo, 
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Published  by  HARPER  &  BROTHERS,  New  York. 


Copyright,  1895,  by  Harper  &  Brothers. 

^//  rights  reseyueei. 


TO 

PAUL    BOURGET 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 

I.  THE  STREETS  OF  PARIS I 


II.  THE  SHOW-PLACES  OF  PARIS— NIGHT      ...  47 

III.  PARIS  IN  MOURNING 98 

IV.  THE  GRAND  PRIX  AND  OTHER  PRIZES     ...  138 
V.  AMERICANS  IN  PARIS 177 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


PAGE 

"PARIS   HAD   TAKEN   OFF   HER   MOURNING"     .       .       •      FrontispUce 
"  THE   CONCIERGE   OF  EACH  HOUSE  STOOD  CONTINUALLY 

AT   THE  FRONT   DOOR  " ^ 

"SHE  LOOKED   DOWN   UPON   OUR   STREET" 9 

"WITH   A   LONG   LOAF   OF   BREAD" ^3 

"TES   DANS    LA   RUE,  VA,  T'ES   CHEZTOl" ^9 

"THE   PARTY   PROMPTLY   BROKE   UP  " ^S 

"AND    TRANSFORM    LONG-HAIRED    STUDENTS   INTO   MEM- 
BERS  OF   THE   INSTITUTE  " 31 

INSIDE   COLUMBIN'S 3' 

"AND   YOU   BELIEVE   THE   GUIDES" 41 

THE   CHATEAU    ROUGE 59 

.       .  65 

AT   BRUANT  S 

AT   THE   BLACK   CAT "^^ 

A   CAFE   CHANTANT '^^ 

83 


93 


ON   MONTMARTRE 

SOME   YOUNG   PEOPLE   OF   MONTMARTRE 

AT  THE   MOULIN   ROUGE 

AT    THE    JARDIN    DE    PARIS ^°3 

PORTRAITS   OF   CARNOT   IN    HEAVY   BLACK IO9 

"TO   BRING   A   QUEEN   BACK   TO   PARIS  " ^5 

"THE   GIRL   WHO    REPRESENTED    ALSACE " 131 

THE   RESTAURANT   AMONG   THE  TREES 143 


X  ILLUSTRATIONS 

PACK 

INTERESTED   IN   THE   WINNER 149 

"AROUND    SOME    STATELY    DIGNITARY" 157 

"THE  MAN  THAT   BROKE   THE   BANK   AT    MONTE    CARLO  "  167 
"LISTENING  FOR   THE   VOICE  TO   lT'EAK   HIS   NAME   ONCE 

more" 179 

"standing  on  their  feet  for  hours  at  a  time"  .  187 
"the  american  colony  is  not  wicked"     .     .     .     .  i95 
what  might  some  time  happen  if  these  were  love- 
MATCHES    203 

"'I   HAVE   ONE   PICTURE  IN   THE   SALON'" 215 


ABOUT     PARIS 


ABOUT    PARIS 


THE   STREETS    OF   PARIS 


I  HE  street  that  I  knew  best  in  Paris 
was  an  unimportant  street,  and  one 
into  which  important  people  seldom 
came,  and  then  only  to  pass  on 
through  it  to  the  Rue  de  Rivoli,  which  ran  par- 
allel with  it,  or  to  the  Rue  Castiglione,  which 
cut  it  evenly  in  two.  It  was  to  them  only  the 
shortest  distance  between  two  points,  for  the 
sidewalks  of  this  street  were  not  sprinkled  with 
damp  sawdust  and  set  out  with  marble-topped 
tables  under  red  awnings,  nor  were  there  the 
mirrors  and  windows  of  jewellers  and  milliners 
along  its  course  to  make  one  turn  and  look.  It 
was  interesting  only  to  those  people  who  lived 
upon  it,  and  to  us  perhaps  only  for  that  reason. 


2  ABOUT   PARIS 

If  you  judged  it  by  the  circumstance  that  we  all 
spent  our  time  in  hanging  out  of  the  windows, 
and  that  the  concierge  of  each  house  stood  con- 
tinually at  the  front  door,  you  would  suppose  it 
to  be  a  most  interesting  thoroughfare,  in  which 
things  were  always  happening.  What  did  hap- 
pen was  not  interesting  to  the  outsider,  and  you 
had  to  live  in  it  some  time  before  you  could  ap- 
preciate the  true  value  of  the  street.  With  one 
exception.  This  was  the  great  distinction  of  our 
street,  and  one  of  which  we  were  very  proud.  A 
poet  had  lived  in  his  way,  and  loved  in  his  way, 
in  one  of  the  houses,  and  had  died  there.  You 
could  read  the  simple,  unromantic  record  of  this 
in  big  black  letters  on  a  tablet  placed  evenly 
between  the  two  windows  of  the  entresol.  It 
gave  a  distinguished  air  to  that  house,  and  ren- 
dered it  different  from  all  of  the  others,  as  a 
Legion  of  Honor  on  the  breast  of  a  French  sol- 
dier makes  him  conspicuous  amongst  his  fellows. 


ALFRED    DE    MUSSET 

ne   a    Paris 

Le    II    Decembre    1810 

est   mort 
dans  cette  maison 

Le  2   Mai    1857 


THE   STREETS   OF   PARIS  5 

We  were  all  pleased  when  people  stopped  and 
read  this  inscription.  We  took  it  as  a  tribute 
to  the  importance  of  our  street,  and  we  felt  a 
proprietary  interest  in  that  tablet  and  in  that 
house,  as  though  this  neighborly  association  with 
genius  was  something  to  our  individual  credit. 

We  had  other  distinguished  people  in  our 
street,  but  they  were  very  much  alive,  and  their 
tablets  were  colored  ones  drawn  by  Cheret,  and 
pasted  up  all  over  Paris  in  endless  repetition ; 
and  though  their  celebrity  may  not  live  as  long 
as  has  the  poet's,  while  they  are  living  they  seem 
to  enjoy  life  as  fully  as  he  did,  and  to  get  out 
of  the  present  all  that  the  present  has  to  give. 

The  one  in  which  we  all  took  the  most  inter- 
est lived  just  across  the  street  from  me,  and  by 
looking  up  a  little  you  could  see  her  looking  out 
of  her  window,  with  her  thick,  heavy  black  hair 
bound  in  bandeaux  across  her  forehead,  and  a 
great  diamond  horseshoe  pinned  at  her  throat, 
and  with  just  a  touch  of  white  powder  showing 
on  her  nose  and  cheeks.  She  looked  as  though 
she  should  have  lived  by  rights  in  the  Faubourg 
St.-Germain,  and  she  used  to  smile  down  rather 
kindly  upon  the  street  with  a  haughty,  tolerant 
look,  as  if  it  amused  her  by  its  simplicity  and 
idleness,  and  by  the  quietness,  which  only  the 


6  ABOUT   PARIS 

cries  of  the  children  or  of  the  hucksters,  or  the 
cracking  at  times  of  a  coachman's  whip,  ever 
broke.  She  looked  very  well  then,  but  it  was  in 
the  morning  that  the  street  saw  her  at  her  best. 
For  it  was  then  that  she  went  out  to  ride  in 
the  Bois  in  her  Whitechapel  cart,  and  as  she 
never  awoke  in  time,  apparently,  we  had  the 
satisfaction  of  watching  the  pony  and  the  tiger 
and  cart  for  an  hour  or  two  until  she  came.  It 
was  a  brown  basket-cart,  and  the  tiger  used  to 
walk  around  it  many  times  to  see  that  it  had 
not  changed  in  any  particular  since  he  had  ex- 
amined it  three  minutes  before,  and  the  air  with 
which  he  did  this  gave  us  an  excellent  idea  of 
the  responsibility  of  his  position.  So  that  peo- 
ple passing  stopped  and  looked  too  —  bakers' 
boys  in  white  linen  caps  and  with  baskets  on 
their  arms,  and  commissionnaires  in  cocked  hats 
and  portfolios  chained  to  their  persons,  and  gen- 
tlemen freshly  made  up  for  the  morning,  with 
waxed  mustaches  and  flat -brimmed  high  hats, 
and  little  girls  with  plaits,  and  little  boys  with 
bare  legs ;  and  all  of  us  in-doors,  as  soon  as  we 
heard  the  pony  stamp  his  sharp  hoofs  on  the 
asphalt,  would  drop  books  or  razors  or  brooms 
or  mops  and  wait  patiently  at  the  window  until 
she  came. 


THE   STREETS   OF   PARIS  7 

When  she  came  she  wore  a  black  habit  with 
fresh  white  gloves,  holding  her  skirt  and  crop  in 
one  hand,  and  the  crowd  would  separate  on  either 
side  of  her.  She  did  not  see  the  crowd.  She 
was  used  to  crowds,  and  she  would  pat  the 
pony's  head  or  rub  his  ears  with  the  fresh  kid 
gloves,  and  tighten  the  buckle  or  shift  a  strap 
with  an  air  quite  as  knowing  as  the  tiger's,  but 
not  quite  so  serious.  Then  she  would  wrap  the 
lap-robe  about  her,  and  her  maid  would  take  her 
place  at  her  side  with  the  spaniel  in  her  arms, 
and  she  would  give  the  pony  the  full  length  of 
the  lash,  and  he  would  go  off  like  a  hound  out  of 
the  leash.  They  always  reached  the  corner  be- 
fore the  tiger  was  able  to  overtake  them,  and  I 
believe  it  was  the  hope  of  seeing  him  some  morn- 
ing left  behind  forever  which  led  to  the  general 
interest  in  their  departure.  And  when  they 
had  gone,  the  crowd  would  look  at  the  empty 
place  in  the  street,  and  at  each  other,  and 
up  at  us  in  the  windows,  and  then  separate, 
and  the  street  would  grow  quiet  again.  One 
could  see  her  again  later,  if  one  wished,  in  the 
evening,  riding  a  great  horse  around  the  ring, 
in  another  habit,  but  with  the  same  haughty 
smile;  ajid  as  the  horse  reared  on  his  hind-legs, 
and  kicked  and  plunged  as  though  he  would  fall 


8  ABOUT   PARIS 

back  on  her,  she  would  smile  at  him  as  she  did 
oil  the  children  in  our  street,  with  the  same  un- 
concerned, amused  look  that  she  would  have 
given  to  a  kitten  playing  with  its  tail. 

The  houses  on  our  street  had  tall  yellow  fronts 
with  gray  slate  roofs,  and  roof-gardens  of  flowers 
and  palms  in  pots.  Some  of  the  houses  had  iron 
balconies,  from  which  the  women  leaned  and 
talked  across  the  street  to  one  another  in  pur- 
ring nasal  voices,  with  a  great  rolling  of  the  r's 
and  an  occasional  disdainful  movement  of  the 
shoulders.  When  any  other  than  a  French 
woman  shrugs  her  shoulders  she  moves  the 
whole  upper  part  of  her  body,  from  the  hips  up ; 
but  the  French  woman's  shoulders  and  arms  are 
all  that  change  when  she  makes  that  ineffable 
gesture  that  we  have  settled  upon  as  the  char- 
acteristic one  of  her  nation. 

In  a  street  of  like  respectability  to  ours  in 
London  or  New  York  those  who  lived  on  it 
would  know  as  little  of  their  next-door  neighbor 
as  of  a  citizen  at  another  end  of  the  town.  The 
house  fronts  would  tell  nothing  to  the  outside 
world ;  they  would  frown  upon  each  other  like 
family  tombs  in  a  cemetery ;  but  in  this  street 
of  Paris  the  people  lived  in  it,  or  on  the  bal- 
conies, or  at  the  windows.     We  knew  what  they 


"she  looked  down  upon  ouk  street 


THE   STREETS   OF   PARIS  II 

were  going  to  have  for  dinner,  because  we  could 
see  them  carrying  the  uncooked  portions  of  it 
from  the  restaurant  at  the  corner,  with  a  long 
loaf  of  bread  under  one  arm  and  a  single  egg  in 
the  other  hand ;  and  when  some  one  gave  a  fete 
we  knew  of  it  by  the  rows  of  bottles  on  the 
ledge  of  the  window  and  the  jellies  set  out  to 
cool  on  the  balcony.  We  were  all  interested  in 
the  efforts  of  the  stout  gentleman  in  the  short  blue 
smoking-jacket  who  taught  his  parrot  to  call  to 
the  coachman  of  each  passing  fiacre  ;  he  did  this 
every  night  after  dinner,  with  his  cigarette  in  his 
mouth,  and  with  great  patience  and  good-nature. 
We  took  a  common  pride  also  in  the  flower- 
garden  of  the  young  people  on  the  seventh  floor, 
and  in  their  arrangement  of  strings  upon  which 
the  vines  were  to  grow,  and  in  the  lines  of  roses, 
which  dropped  their  petals  whenever  the  wind 
blew,  upon  the  head  of  the  concierge,  so  that  she 
would  look  up  and  shake  her  head  at  them,  and 
then  go  inside  and  get  a  broom  and  sweep  the 
leaves  carefully  away.  When  any  one  in  our 
street  went  off  in  his  best  clothes  in  a  fiacre  we 
looked  after  him  with  envy,  and  yet  with  a  cer- 
tain pride  that  we  lived  with  such  fortunate  peo- 
ple, who  were  evidently  much  sought  after  in 
the  fashionable  world ;  and  when  a  musician  or 


12  ABOUT   PARIS 

a  blind  man  broke  the  silence  of  our  street 
with  his  music  or  his  calls,  we  vied  with  one  an- 
other in  throwing  him  coppers — not  on  his  ac- 
count at  all,  but  because  we  wished  to  stand 
well  in  the  opinion  of  our  neighbors.  It  was 
like  camping  out  on  two  sides  of  a  valley  where 
every  one  could  look  over  into  the  other's  tent. 
There  was  a  young  couple  near  the  corner, 
who,  I  think,  had  but  lately  married,  and  every 
evening  she  used  to  watch  for  him  in  a  fresh 
gown  for  a  half-hour  or  so  before  he  came.  Dur- 
ing the  day  she  wore  a  very  plain  gown,  and  her 
eyes  wandered  everywhere ;  but  during  that  half- 
hour  before  he  came  she  never  changed  her  po- 
sition nor  relaxed  her  vigil.  And  it  made  us  all 
quite  uncomfortable,  and  we  could  not  give  our 
attention  to  anything  else  until  he  had  turned 
the  corner  and  waved  his  hand,  and  she  had  an- 
swered him  with  a  start  and  a  little  shrug  of 
content.  After  dinner  they  appeared  together, 
and  he  would  put  his  arm  around  her  waist, 
with  that  refreshing  disregard  for  the  world  that 
French  lovers  have,  and  they  would  smile  down 
upon  us  in  a  very  happy  and  superior  manner,  or 
up  at  the  sun  as  it  sank  a  brilliant  red  at  the 
end  of  our  street,  with  the  hundreds  of  chimney- 
pots looking  like  black  musical  notes  against  it. 


"WITH   A   LONG   LOAF   OF   BREAD" 


THE   STREETS   OF   PARIS  15 

There  was  also  a  very  interesting  old  lady  in 
the  house  that  blocked  the  end  of  our  street,  a 
very  fat  and  masculine  old  lady  in  a  loose  white 
wrapper,  who  spent  all  of  her  time  rearranging 
her  plants  and  flowers,  and  kept  up  an  amiable 
rivalry  with  the  people  in  the  balconies  above 
and  below  her  in  the  abundance  and  verdure  of 
her  garden.  It  was  a  very  pleasant  competition 
for  the  rest  of  us,  as  it  hung  that  end  of  the 
street  with  a  curtain  of  living  green. 

For  a  little  time  there  was  a  young  girl  who 
used  to  sit  upon  the  balcony  whenever  the  sun 
was  brightest  and  the  air  not  too  chill  ;  but  she 
took  no  interest  in  the  street,  for  she  knew  noth- 
ing of  it  except  its  noises.  She  lay  always  in  an 
invalid's  chair,  looking  up  at  the  sky  and  the 
roof-line  above,  and  with  her  profile  against  the 
gray  wall.  During  the  day  a  nurse  in  a  white 
cap  sat  with  her;  but  after  dinner  a  stout,  jaunty 
man  of  middle  age  came  back  from  his  club  or 
his  bureau,  and  took  the  place  beside  her  until  it 
grew  dark,  when  he  and  the  nurse  would  lift  her 
in-doors  again,  and  he  would  take  his  hat  and  go 
off  to  the  boulevards,  I  suppose,  to  cheer  himself 
a  bit.  It  did  not  last  long,  for  one  day  I  came 
home  to  find  them  taking  down  a  black-and-sil- 
ver  curtain  from  the  front  of  the  house,  and  the 


l6  ABOUT   PARIS 

concierge  said  that  the  girl  had  been  buried,  and 
that  her  father  was  now  quite  alone.  For  the 
first  week  after  that  he  did  not  go  to  the  boule- 
vards, but  used  to  sit  out  on  the  balcony  until 
late  into  the  evening,  with  the  night  about  him, 
so  that  we  would  not  have  known  he  was  there 
save  for  the  light  of  his  cigar  burning  in  the 
darkness. 

The  step  from  our  street  to  the  boulevards  is 
a  much  longer  one  in  the  imagination  than  in 
actual  distance.  Our  street,  after  all,  was  only 
typical  of  thousands  of  other  Parisian  streets, 
and  when  you  have  explained  it  you  have  de- 
scribed miles  after  miles  of  other  streets  like  it. 
But  there  is  nothing  just  like  the  boulevards.  If 
you  should  wish  to  sit  at  the  exact  centre  of  the 
world  and  to  watch  it  revolve  around  you,  you 
have  only  to  take  your  place  at  that  corner  table 
of  the  Cafe  de  la  Paix  which  juts  the  farthest  out 
into  the  Avenue  de  I'Opera  and  the  Boulevard 
Capucines.  This  table  is  the  apex  of  all  the 
other  tables.  It  turns  the  tides  of  pedestrians  on 
the  broad  sidewalks  of  both  the  great  thorough- 
fares, and  it  is  geographically  situated  exactly 
under  the  "  de  la "  of  the  "  Cafe  de  la  Paix," 
painted  in  red  letters  on  the  awning  over  your 
head.     From   this   admirable   position   you  can 


THE   STREETS   OF   PARIS  \^ 

sweep  the  square  in  front  of  the  Opera-house, 
the  boulevard  itself,  and  the  three  great  streets 
running  into  it  from  the  river.  People  move 
obligingly  around  and  up  and  down  and  across 
these,  and  if  you  sit  there  long  enough  you 
will  see  every  one  worth  seeing  in  the  known 
world. 

There  is  a  large  class  of  Parisians  whose  knowl- 
edge of  that  city  is  limited  to  the  boulevards. 
They  neither  know  nor  care  to  know  of  any 
other  part ;  we  read  about  them  a  great  deal,  of 
them  and  their  witticisms  and  cafe  politics ;  and 
what  "the  boulevards  "  think  of  this  or  that  is  as 
seriously  quoted  as  what "  a  gentleman  very  near 
the  President,"  or  "  a  diplomat  whose  name  I  am 
requested  not  to  give,  but  who  is  in  a  position  to 
know  whereof  he  speaks,"  cares  to  say  of  public 
matters  at  home.  For  my  part,  I  should  think 
an  existence  limited  to  two  sidewalks  would  be 
somewhat  sad,  especially  if  it  were  continued 
into  the  middle  age,  which  all  boulevardiers  seem 
to  have  already  attained.  It  does  not  strike  one 
as  a  difficult  school  to  enter,  or  as  one  for  which 
there  is  any  long  apprenticeship.  You  have  only 
to  sit  for  an  hour  every  evening  under  the  "  de 
la,"  and  you  will  find  that  you  know  by  sight 
half   the  faces  of  the   men  who  pass  you,  who 


l8  ABOUT   PARIS 

come  up  suddenly  out  of  the  night  and  disappear 
again,  hke  sHdes  in  a  stereopticon,  or  whom  you 
find  next  you  when  you  take  your  place,  and 
whom  you  leave  behind,  still  sipping  from  the 
half-empty  glasses  ordered  three  hours  before  you 
came. 

The  man  who  goes  to  Paris  for  a  summer  must 
be  a  very  misanthropic  and  churlish  individual  if 
he  tires  of  the  boulevards  in  that  short  period. 
There  is  no  place  so  amusing  for  the  stranger  be- 
tween the  hours  of  six  and  seven  and  eleven  and 
one  as  these  same  boulevards ;  but  to  the  Paris- 
ian what  a  bore  it  must  become  !  That  is,  what 
a  bore  it  would  become  to  any  one  save  a  Paris- 
ian !  To  have  the  same  fat  man  with  the  som- 
brero and  the  waxed  mustache  snap  patent 
match-boxes  in  your  face  day  after  day  and 
night  after  night,  and  to  have  *'  Carnot  at  Long- 
champs"  taking  off  his  hat  and  putting  it  on 
again  held  out  for  your  inspection  for  weeks, 
and  to  seek  the  same  insipid  silly  faces  of  boys 
with  broad  velvet  collars  and  stocks,  which  they 
believe  are  worn  by  Englishmen,  and  the  same 
pompous  gentlemen  who  cut  their  white  goatees 
as  do  military  men  of  the  Second  Empire,  and 
who  hope  that  the  ruddiness  of  their  cheeks, 
which  is  due  to  the  wines  of  Burgundy,  will  be  at- 


^w^l. 


TES   DANS   LA   RUE,  VA,   t'eS   CHEZTOI  " 


THE   STREETS    OF    PARIS  21 

tributed  to  the  suns  of  Tunis  and  Algiers.  And 
the  same  women,  the  one  with  the  mustache  and 
the  younger  one  with  the  black  curl,  and  the 
hundreds  of  others,  silent  and  panther-like,  and 
growing  obviously  more  ugly  as  the  night  grows 
later  and  the  streets  more  deserted.  If  any  one 
aspires  to  be  known  among  such  as  these,  his 
aspirations  are  easily  gratified.  He  can  have  his 
heart's  desire;  he  need  only  walk  the  boulevards 
for  a  week,  and  he  will  be  recognized  as  a  boule- 
vardier.  It  is  a  cheap  notoriety,  purchased  at 
the  expense  of  the  easy  exercise  of  walking,  and 
the  cost  of  some  few  glasses  of  "  bock,"  with  a 
few  cents  to  the  waiter.  There  is  much  excuse 
for  the  visitor ;  he  is  really  to  be  envied ;  it  is 
all  new  and  strange  and  absurd  to  him  ;  but 
what  an  old,  old  story  it  must  be  to  the  boule- 
vardier ! 

The  visitor,  perhaps,  has  never  sat  out-of-doors 
before  and  taken  his  ease  on  the  sidewalk.  Yet 
it  seems  a  perfectly  natural  thing  to  do,  until  he 
imagines  himself  doing  the  same  thing  at  home. 
There  was  a  party  of  men  and  women  from  New 
York  sitting  in  front  of  the  Cafe  de  la  Paix  one 
night  after  the  opera,  and  enjoying  themselves 
very  much,  until  one  of  them  suggested  their 
doing  the  same  thinfj  the  next  month  at  home. 


22  ABOUT    PARIS 

"We  will  all  take  chairs,"  he  said,  "  and  sit  at  the 
corner  of  Twenty-sixth  Street  and  Broadway  at 
twelve  o'clock  at  night  and  drink  bock-bier," 
and  the  idea  was  so  impossible  that  the  party 
promptly  broke  up  and  went  to  their  hotels. 

Of  course  the  visitor  in  Paris  misses  a  great 
deal  that  the  true  boulevardier  enjoys  through 
not  knowing  or  understanding  all  that  he  sees. 
But,  on  the  other  hand,  he  has  an  advantage  in 
being  able  to  imagine  that  he  is  surrounded  by  all 
the  famous  journalists  and  poets  and  noted  duel- 
lists ;  and  every  clerk  with  a  portfolio  becomes  a 
Deputy,  and  every  powdered  and  auburn-haired 
woman  who  passes  in  an  open  fiacre  is  a  cele- 
brated actress  of  the  Comedie  Fran^aise.  He 
can  distribute  titles  as  freely  as  the  Papal  court, 
and  transform  long-haired  students  into  members 
of  the  Institute,  and  promote  the  boys  of  the 
Polytechnic  School,  in  their  holiday  cocked  hats 
and  play-swords,  into  lieutenants  and  captains  of 
the  regular  army.  He  believes  that  the  ill-look- 
ing individual  in  rags  who  shows  such  apparent 
fear  of  the  policeman  on  the  corner  really  has 
forbidden  prints  and  books  to  sell,  and  that  the 
guides  who  hover  about  like  vultures  looking  for 
a  fresh  victim  have  it  in  their  power  to  show  him 
things  to  which  they  only  hold  the  key — things 


THE   STREETS   OF   PARIS  23 

which  any  Frenchman  could  tell  him  he  could 
see  at  his  own  home  if  he  has  the  taste  for  such 
sights. 

The  best  of  the  boulevards  is  that  the  people 
sitting  on  their  sidewalks,  and  the  heavy  green 
trees,  and  the  bare  heads  of  so  many  of  the 
women,  make  one  feel  how  much  out-of-doors  he 
is,  as  no  other  street  or  city  does,  and  what  a 
folly  it  is  to  waste  time  within  walls.  I  do  not 
think  we  appreciate  how  much  we  owe  to  the 
women  in  Paris  who  go  without  bonnets.  They 
give  the  city  so  homelike  and  friendly  an  air,  as 
though  every  woman  knew  every  other  woman 
so  well  that  she  did  not  mind  running  across  the 
street  to  gossip  with  her  neighbor  without  the 
formality  of  a  head -covering.  And  it  really 
seems  strange  that  the  prettiest  bonnets  should 
come  from  the  city  where  the  women  of  the 
poorer  classes  have  shown  how  very  pretty  a 
woman  of  any  class  can  look  without  any  bonnet 
at  all. 

The  enduring  nature  of  the  boulevards  impress- 
es one  who  sees  them  at  different  hours  as  much 
as  does  their  life  and  gayety  at  every  hour.  You 
sometimes  think  surely  to-morrow  they  will  rest, 
and  the  cafes  will  be  closed,  and  the  long  pass- 
ing stream  of  cabs  and  omnibuses  will  stop,  and 


24  ABOUT   PARIS 

the  asphalt  street  will  be  permitted  to  rest  from 
its  burden.  You  may  think  this  at  night,  but 
when  you  turn  up  again  at  nine  the  next  morn- 
ing you  will  find  it  all  just  as  you  left  it  at  one  the 
same  morning.  The  same  waiters,  the  same  rush 
of  carriages,  the  same  ponderous  omnibuses  with 
fine  straining  white  horses,  the  flowers  in  the 
booths,  and  the  newspapers  neatly  piled  round 
the  colored  kiosks. 

The  Champs  Elys^es  is  hardly  a  street,  but  as 
a  thoroughfare  it  is  the  most  remarkable  in  the 
world.  It  is  a  much  better  show  than  are  the 
boulevards.  The  place  for  which  you  pay  to 
enter  is  generally  more  interesting  than  the  place 
to  which  admittance  is  free,  and  any  one  can  walk 
along  the  boulevards,  but  to  ride  in  the  Champs 
Elysees  you  must  pay  something,  even  if  you 
take  your  fiacre  by  the  hour.  Some  Parisians 
regret  that  the  Avenue  des  Champs  Elysees 
should  be  so  cheapened  that  it  is  not  reserved  for 
carriages  hired  by  the  month,  and  not  by  the 
course,  and  that  omnibuses  and  hired  cabs  are 
not  kept  out  of  it,  as  they  are  kept  out  of  Hyde 
Park.  But  should  this  rule  obtain  the  Avenue 
des  Champs  Elysees  would  lose  the  most  amus- 
ing of  its  features.  It  would  shut  out  the  young 
married  couples  and  their  families  and  friends  in 


THE   STREETS    OF    PARIS  27 

their  gala  clothes,  which  look  strangely  unfamil- 
iar in  the  sunlight,  and  make  you  think  that  the 
wearers  have  been  up  all  night ;  and  the  hundreds 
of  girls  in  pairs  from  the  Jardin  de  Paris,  who 
have  halved  the  expense  of  a  fiacre,  but  who 
cannot  yet  afford  a  brougham  ;  and  the  English 
tourists  dressed  in  flannel  shirts  and  hunting-caps 
and  knickerbockers,  exactly  as  though  they  were 
penetrating  the  mountains  of  Afghanistan  or  the 
deserts  of  Syria,  and  as  unashamed  of  their  pro- 
vincialism as  the  young  marquis  who  passes  on 
his  dog-cart  is  unashamed  of  having  placed  the 
girl  with  him  on  his  right  hand  instead  of  his 
left,  though  by  so  doing  he  tells  every  one  who 
passes  who  and  what  she  is.  It  would  shut  out  the 
omnibuses,  with  the  rows  of  spectators  on  their 
tops,  who  lean  on  their  knees  and  look  down  into 
the  carriages  below,  and  point  out  the  prettiest 
gowns  and  faces ;  and  it  would  exclude  the 
market-wagons  laden  with  huge  piles  of  yellow 
carrots  and  purple  radishes,  with  a  woman  driv- 
ing on  the  box-seat,  and  a  dog  chained  beside  her. 
There  is  no  other  place  in  the  world,  unless  it  be 
Piccadilly  at  five  o'clock  in  the  afternoon,  where 
so  many  breeds  of  horses  trot  side  by  side,  where 
the  chains  of  the  baron  banker  and  the  cracking 
whip  of  a  drunken  cabman  and  the  horn  of  some 


28  ABOUT    PARIS 

American  millionaire's  four-in-hand  all  sound  at 
the  same  time.  To  be  known  is  easy  in  the  boule- 
vards, but  it  is  a  distinction  in  the  Avenue  des 
Champs  Elysees — a  distinction  which  costs  much 
money  and  which  lasts  an  hour.  Sometimes  it 
is  gained  by  liveries  and  trappings  and  a  large 
red  rosette  in  the  button-hole,  or  by  driving  the 
same  coach  at  the  same  hour  at  the  same  rate  of 
speed  throughout  the  season,  or  by  wearing  a  fez, 
or  by  sending  two  sais  ahead  of  your  cart  to 
make  a  way  for  it,  or  by  a  beautiful  face  and  a 
throughbred  pug  on  a  cushion  at  your  side,  al- 
though this  last  mode  is  not  so  easy,  as  there  are 
many  pretty  faces  and  many  softly  cushioned 
victorias  and  innumerable  pug-dogs,  and  when 
the  prevailing  color  for  the  hair  happens  to  be 
red — as  it  was  last  summer — the  chance  of  gain- 
ing any  individuality  becomes  exceedingly  dififi- 
cult.  When  all  of  these  people  meet  in  the  after- 
noon on  their  way  to  and  from  the  Bois,  there  is 
no  better  entertainment  of  the  sort  in  the  world, 
and  the  avenue  grows  much  too  short,  and  the 
hours  before  dinner  even  shorter.  There  are 
women  in  light  billowy  toilets,  with  elbows 
squared  and  whip  in  hand,  fearlessly  driving 
great  English  horses  from  the  top  of  a  mail- 
phaeton,  while  a  frightened  little  English  groom 


THE   STREETS   OF   PARIS  29 

clutches  at  the  rail  and  peers  over  their  shoulder 
to  grasp  the  reins  if  need  be,  or  to  jump  if  he 
must.  And  there  are  narrow-chested  corseted  and 
padded  young  Frenchmen  in  white  kid  gloves, 
who  hold  one  rein  in  each  hand  as  little  girls 
hold  a  skipping-rope,  and  who  imagine  they  are 
so  like  Englishmen  that  no  one  can  distinguish 
them  even  by  their  accent.  There  are  fat  He- 
brew bankers  and  their  equally  fat  sons  in  open 
victorias,  who,  lacking  the  spirit  of  the  French- 
men, who  at  least  attempt  to  drive  themselves, 
recline  consciously  on  cushions,  like  the  poodles 
in  the  victorias  of  the  ladies  with  the  red  hair. 
There  are  also  visiting  princes  from  India  or 
pashas  from  Egypt;  or  diplomats  of  the  last 
Spanish-American  republic,  as  dark  as  the  ne- 
groes of  Sixth  Avenue,  but  with  magnificent 
liveries  and  clanking  chains  ;  the  nabobs  of  Haiti, 
of  Algiers  and  Tunis,  and  with  these  the  beauti- 
ful Spanish-looking  woman  from  South  America, 
the  wives  of  the  rastaqoiicrcs ;  and  mixed  with 
these  is  the  long  string  of  book-makers  and 
sporting  men  coming  back  from  the  races  at 
Longchamps  or  Auteuil,  red-faced  and  hot  and 
dusty,  with  glasses  strapped  around  them,  and 
the  badges  still  flying  from  their  button-holes. 
There   are   three   rows   of    carriages   down,  and 


30  ABOUT   PARIS 

three  of  carriages  up,  and  if  you  look  from  the 
Arc  deTriomphe  to  the  Tuileries  you  see  a  broken 
mass  of  glittering  carriage-tops  and  lace  parasols, 
and  what  looks  like  the  flashing  of  thousands  of 
mirrors  as  the  setting  sun  strikes  on  the  glass  of 
the  lamps  and  windows  and  on  the  lacquered 
harness  and  polished  mountings.  Whether  you 
view  this  procession  from  the  rows  of  green  iron 
seats  on  either  side  or  as  a  part  of  it,  you  must 
feel  lifted  up  by  its  movement  and  color  and  the 
infinite  variety  of  its  changes.  A  man  might  live 
in  the  Champs  Elysees  for  a  week  or  a  month, 
seeing  no  more  of  Paris  than  he  finds  under  its 
beautiful  trees  or  on  its  broad  thoroughfare,  and 
be  so  well  content  with  that  much  of  the  city  as 
to  prefer  it  to  all  other  cities. 

There  was  a  little  fat  man  in  his  shirt  sleeves 
one  morning  in  front  of  the  Theatre  of  the  Re- 
public, which,  as  everybody  knows,  stands  under 
the  trees  in  the  Champs  Elysees,  on  the  Rue 
Matignon,  hanging  a  new  curtain,  and  the  fat 
man,  as  the  proprietor  and  manager,  Avas  nat- 
urally anxious.  Two  small  boys  with  their  bare 
legs,  and  leather  belts  about  their  smocks,  and  a 
nurse  with  broad  blue  ribbons  down  her  back, 
and  myself  looked  our  admiration  from  the  out- 
side of  the  roped  enclosure.     The  orchestra  had 


THE   STREETS   OF   PARIS  33 

laid  down  its  fiddle,  and  was  helping  the  man 
who  takes  the  twenty  centimes  to  adjust  the 
square  yard  of  canvas.  The  proprietor  placed 
his  fat  fingers  on  the  small  of  his  back  and  threw 
his  head  to  one  side  and  shut  one  eye.  We  wait- 
ed breathlessly  for  his  opinion.  He  took  two 
steps  backward  from  the  ten-centime  seats,  and 
studied  the  effect  of  the  curtain  from  that  dis- 
tance, with  his  chin  thrown  up  and  his  arms  fold- 
ed severely.  We  suggested  that  it  was  an  im- 
provement on  the  old  curtain,  and  one  that  would 
be  sure  to  catch  the  passer's  eye. 

"  Possibly,"  the  proprietor  said,  indulgently, 
and  then  wiped  his  brow  and  shook  his  head. 
He  told  us  we  had  little  idea  how  great  were  the 
trials  of  an  wiprcsario  of  an  open-air  theatre  in 
the  Champs  Elysees.  What  with  the  rent  and 
the  cost  of  the  costumes  and  the  employment 
of  three  assistants — one  to  work  the  marionettes, 
and  one  to  take  up  the  money,  and  one  to  play 
in  the  orchestra  —  expenses  did  run  up.  Of 
course  there  was  madame,  his  wife,  who  made 
costumes  herself  better  than  those  that  could  be 
bought  at  the  regular  costumers',  and  that  was  a 
saving ;  and  then  she  also  helped  in  working  the 
figures  when  there  were  more  than  two  on  the 
scene  at  once,  but  this  was  hard  upon  her,  as  she 
3 


34  ABOUT   PARIS 

was  stout,  and  the  heat  at  the  top  of  the  tin- 
roofed  theatre  up  among  the  dusty  flies  was  try- 
ing. And  then,  I  suggested,  there  was  much 
competition.  The  proprietor  waved  a  contempt- 
uous dismissal  of  the  claims  of  the  four  little  the- 
atres about  him.  It  was  not  their  rivalry  that  he 
cared  for.  It  is  true  the  seats  were  filled,  but 
with  whom  ?  Ah,  yes,  with  whom  ?  He  placed 
his  finger  at  the  side  of  his  nose,  and  winked  and 
nodded  his  head  mysteriously.  With  the  friends 
of  the  proprietor,  of  course.  Poor  non- paying 
acquaintances  to  make  a  show,  and  attract  oth- 
ers less  knowing  to  a  very  inferior  performance. 
Now  here  with  him  everybody  paid,  and  received 
the  worth  of  his  money  many  times.  Perhaps  I 
had  not  seen  the  performance ;  in  that  case  I 
should  surely  do  so.  The  clown  and  the  donkey- 
cart  were  very  amusing,  and  the  dancing  skele- 
ton, which  came  to  pieces  before  the  audience 
and  frightened  the  gendarme,  was  worthy  of  my 
approval.  So  the  two  small  boys  and  the  nurse 
and  the  baby  and  I  dodged  under  the  rope  and 
waited  for  the  performance. 

The  idle  man,  who  knows  that  "  they  also 
serve  who  only  stand  and  wait,"  must  find  the 
Champs  Elysees  the  most  acceptable  of  all  places 
for  such  easy  service.     There  are  at  one  corner 


THE   STREETS   OF   PARIS  35 

the  stamp-collectors  to  entertain  him,  with  their 
scrap-books  and  market-baskets  full  of  their  pre- 
cious bits  of  colored  paper,  gathered  from  all 
over  the  known  world,  comparing  and  examining 
their  treasures,  bargaining  with  easy  good-nature 
and  with  the  zeal  of  enthusiasts.  Three  times  a 
week  he  will  find  this  open  market  or  exchange 
under  the  trees,  where  old  men  and  little  boys 
and  pretty  young  girls  meet  together  and  chat- 
ter over  their  common  hobby,  and  swap  Colum- 
bian stamps  for  those  of  some  French  protector- 
ate, and  of  many  other  places  of  which  they  know 
nothing  save  that  it  has  a  post-office  of  its  own. 
At  another  corner  there  are  smoothly  -  shaven 
men  and  plump,  well-fed -looking  women  wait- 
ing to  take  service  on  some  gentleman's  box- 
seat  or  in  front  of  some  lady's  cooking-stove — 
an  intelligence  office  where  there  is  no  middle- 
man to  whom  they  must  pay  a  fee,  and  where, 
while  they  wait  for  a  possible  employer,  they 
hold  an  impromptu  picnic,  and  pay  such  gallant 
compliments  that  one  can  see  they  have  lived 
much  in  the  fashionable  world. 

Or  the  idler  can  drop  into  a  chair  in  one  of 
the  cafes  chantants  on  an  off  day,  when  there  is 
no  regular  performance,  but  a  rehearsal,  to  which 
the  public  is  neither  invited  nor  forbidden.     It 


36  ABOUT   PARIS 

is  an  entertaining  place  in  which  to  spend  an 
hour  or  two,  with  something  to  drink  in  front  of 
you,  and  a  cigar,  and  the  sun  shining  through 
the  trees  upon  the  mirrors  and  artificial  flowers 
and  the  gaudy  hangings  of  the  stage.  Here  you 
will  see  Mile.  Nicolle  as  she  is  in  her  moments  of 
leisure.  The  night  before  she  wore  a  greasy  ging- 
ham gown,  with  her  hair  plastered  over  her  fore- 
head in  oily  flat  curls,  as  a  laundress  or  char- 
woman of  Montmartre  might  wear  them.  Now 
she  is  fashionably  dressed  in  black,  with  white 
lace  over  it,  and  with  a  lace  parasol,  which  she 
swings  from  her  finger  in  time  to  the  music, 
while  the  other  artists  of  the  Ambassadeurs'  stand 
farther  up  the  stage  waiting  their  turn,  or  po- 
litely watch  her  from  the  front.  The  girl  who 
chalked  her  face  as  Pierrot  the  evening  before 
follows  her  in  a  blue  boating-dress  and  a  kick  at 
the  end  of  it,  which  she  means  to  introduce  later 
in  the  same  day  ;  and  the  others  comment  audi- 
bly on  it  from  their  seats,  calling  her  by  her  first 
name,  and  disagreeing  with  the  leader  of  the  or- 
chestra as  to  the  particular  note  upon  which  the 
kick  should  come,  while  he  turns  in  his  seat  with 
his  violin  on  his  knee  and  argues  it  out  with 
them,  shrugging  his  shoulders,  and  making  passes 
in  the  air  with  his  lighted  cigarette  as  though  it 


THE   STREETS   OF   PARIS  39 

were  a  baton.  Two  gendarmes,  with  their  capes 
folded  and  thrown  over  their  shoulders,  come  in 
and  stand  with  the  waiters,  surveying  the  re- 
hearsal with  critical  disapproval,  and  the  woman 
who  collects  the  pennies  for  the  iron  seats  in  the 
avenue  takes  a  few  moments'  recess,  and  brings 
with  her  two  nurse-maids,  with  their  neglected 
charges  swinging  by  the  silken  straps  around 
their  silken  bodies.  And  so  they  all  stand  at 
one  side  and  gaze  with  large  eyes  at  the  breath- 
less, laughing  young  woman  on  the  stage  above 
them,  who  runs  and  kicks  and  runs  back  and 
kicks  again,  reflected  many  times  in  the  back- 
ground of  mirrors  around  her ;  and  then  the  two 
American  song-and-dance  men,  and  the  English 
acrobats,  and  the  Italian  who  owns  the  perform- 
ing dogs,  and  the  smooth-faced  French  come- 
diennes, and  all  the  idle  gentlemen  with  glasses 
of  bock  before  them,  sit  up  as  though  some  one 
had  touched  their  shoulders  with  a  whip,  and  all 
the  actresses  smile  politely,  and  look  with  pressed 
lips  and  half-closed  eyes  at  a  very  tall  woman 
with  red  hair,  who  walks  erectly  down  the  stage 
with  a  roll  of  music  in  her  gloved  hands.  This 
is  Yvette  Guilbert,  the  most  artistic  and  the  most 
improper  of  all  the  women  of  the  cafes  chan- 
tants.     She  is  also  the  most  graceful.     You  can 


40  ABOUT   PARIS 

see  that  even  now  when  she  is  off  her  guard. 
She  could  not  make  an  ungraceful  gesture  even 
after  long  practice,  and  when  she  shudders  and 
jumps  at  a  false  note  from  the  orchestra  she  is 
still  graceful. 

When  the  rehearsal  is  finished  you  can  cross 
the  Place  de  la  Concorde  and  hang  over  the 
stone  parapet,  and  watch  the  Deputies  coming 
over  the  bridge,  or  the  men  washing  the  dogs  in 
the  Seine,  and  shaving  and  trimming  their  tufts 
of  curly  hair,  and  twisting  their  mustaches  into 
military  jauntiness ;  or  you  can  turn  your  back 
to  this  and  watch  the  thousands  of  carriages  and 
cabs  and  omnibuses  crossing  the  great  square 
before  you  from  the  eight  streets  opening  into  it, 
with  the  water  of  the  fountains  in  the  middle 
blown  into  spray  by  the  wind,  and  turned  into 
the  colors  of  the  rainbow  by  the  sun.  This  great, 
beautiful  open  place,  even  to  one  accustomed 
to  city  streets  and  their  monuments,  seems  to 
change  more  rapidly  and  to  form  with  greater 
life  than  any  other  spot  in  the  world,  and  its 
great  stupid  obelisk  in  the  centre  appears  to  rise 
like  a  monster  exclamation-point  of  wonder  at 
what  it  sees  about  it,  and  with  the  surprise  over 
all  of  finding  itself  in  the  centre  of  it. 

You  cannot  say  you  have  seen  the  streets  of 


THE   STREETS   OF   PARIS  43 

Paris  until  you   have  walked  them   at  sunrise ; 
every  one  has  seen  them  at  night,  but  he  must 
watch  them  change  from  night  to  day  before  he 
can  claim  to  have  seen  them   at  their  best.     I 
walked  under  the  arches  of  the  Rue  de  Rivoli 
one  morning  when  it  was  so  dark  that  they  looked 
like  the  cloisters  of  some  great  monastery,  and  it 
was  impossible  to  believe  that  the  empty  length 
of  the  Rue  Cambon  had  but  an  hour  before  been 
blocked   by  the  blazing  front    of  the  Olympia, 
and  before  that  with  rows  of  carriages  in  front  of 
the  two  Columbins.     There  were  a  few  belated 
cabs  hugging   the    sidewalk,  with    their   drivers 
asleep  on  the  boxes,  and  a  couple  of  gendarmes 
slouching  together  across  the  Place  de  la  Con- 
corde made  the  only  sound  of  life  in  the  whole 
city.     The  Seine  lay  as  motionless  as  water  in  a 
bath-tub,  and  the  towers  of  Notre  Dame  rising 
out  of  the  mist  at  one  end,  and  the  round  bulk 
of  the  Trocad^ro  bounding  it  at  the  other,  seemed 
to  limit  the  river  to  what  one  could  see  of  its 
silent  surface  from  the  Bridge  of  the  Deputies. 
The    Eiffel   Tower,   the    great   skeleton    of   the 
departed  exposition,  disappeared   and   reformed 
itself    again    as   drifting    clouds   of   mist   swept 
through  it   and   cut   its  great   ugly  length  into 
fragments  hung  in  mid-air.     As  the  light  grew 


44 


ABOUT    PARIS 


in  strength  the  facades  of  the  government  build- 
ings grew  in  outline,  as  though  one  were  focus- 
sing them  through  an  opera-glass,  and  the  pillars 
of  the  Madeleine  took  form  and  substance;  then 
the  whole  great  square  showed  itself,  empty  and 
deserted.  The  darkness  had  hidden  nothing 
more  terrible  than  the  clean  asphalt  and  the  mo- 
tionless statues  of  the  cities  of  France. 

A  solitary  fiacre  passed  me  slowly  with  no  one 
on  the  box,  but  with  the  coachman  sitting  back 
in  his  cab.  He  was  returning  to  the  stables, 
evidently,  and  had  on  his  way  given  a  seat  to  a 
girl  from  the  street,  whom  he  was  now  entertain- 
ing with  genial  courtesy.  He  had  one  leg  thrown 
over  the  other,  and  one  arm  passed  back  along  the 
top  of  the  seat,  and  with  the  other  he  waved  to  the 
great  buildings  as  they  sprang  up  into  life  as  the 
day  grew.  The  girl  beside  him  was  smiling  at 
his  pleasantries,  while  the  rising  sun  showed  how 
tired  and  pale  she  was,  and  mocked  at  the  paint 
around  her  sleepy  eyes.  The  horse  stumbled  at 
every  sixth  step,  and  then  woke  again,  while  the 
whip  rocked  and  rolled  fantastically  in  its  socket 
like  a  drunken  man.  From  up  the  avenue  of 
the  Champs  Elysees  came  the  first  of  the  heavy 
market-wagons,  with  the  driver  asleep  on  the 
bench,  and  his  lantern  burning  dully  in  the  early 


THE   STREETS   OF   PARIS  45 

light.  Back  of  him  lay  the  deserted  stretch  of 
the  avenue,  strange  and  unfamiliar  in  its  empti- 
ness— save  for  the  great  arch  that  rose  against 
the  dawn,  and  seemed,  from  its  elevation  on  the 
very  top  of  the  horizon,  to  serve  as  a  gateway 
into  the  skies  beyond.  The  air  in  the  Champs 
Elysees  was  heavy  with  a  perfume  of  flowers 
and  of  green  plants,  and  the  leaves  dripped  damp 
and  cool  with  the  dew.  Hundreds  of  birds  sang 
and  chattered  as  though  they  knew  the  solitude 
was  theirs  but  for  only  one  more  brief  hour,  and 
that  they  then  must  give  way  to  the  little  chil- 
dren, and  later  to  crowds  of  idle  men  and  wom- 
en. It  seemed  impossible  that  but  a  few  hours 
before  Duclerc  had  filled  these  silent,  cool  woods 
with  her  voice — Duclerc,  with  her  shoulder-straps 
slipping  to  her  elbows  and  her  white  powdered 
arms  tossing  in  the  colored  lights  of  the  serpen- 
tine dance.  The  long,  gaudy  lithographs  on  the 
bill-boards  and  the  arches  of  colored  lamps  stood 
out  of  the  silence  and  fresh  beauty  of  the  hour 
like  the  relics  of  some  feast  which  should  have 
been  cleared  away  before  the  dawn,  and  the  the- 
atres themselves  looked  like  temples  to  a  hea- 
then idol  in  some  primeval  wood.  And  as  I 
passed  out  from  under  the  cool  trees  to  the  si- 
lent avenues  I  felt  as  thouirh  I  had  caught  Paris 


46  ABOUT   PARIS 

napping,  and  when  she  was  off  her  guard,  and 
good  and  fresh  and  sweet,  and  had  discovered  a 
hidden  trait  in  her  many-sided  character,  a  mo- 
ment of  which  she  would  be  ashamed  an  hour 
or  two  later,  as  cynics  are  ashamed  of  their  se- 
cret acts  of  charity. 


II 


THE   SHOW-PLACES   OF    PARIS 


NIGHT 


^>^1^^  ARIS  is  the  only  city  in  the  world 
W^l^    which   the  visitor   from   the   outside 

positively  refuses   to   take   seriously. 

He  may  have  come  to  Paris  with  an 
earnest  purpose  to  study  art,  or  to  investigate  the 
intricacies  of  French  law,  or  the  historical  changes 
of  the  city ;  or,  if  it  be  a  woman,  she  may  have 
come  to  choose  a  trousseau  ;  but  no  matter  how 
serious  his  purpose  may  be,  there  is  always  some 
one  part  of  each  day  when  the  visitor  rests  from 
his  labors  and  smiles  indulgently  and  does  as  the 
Parisians  do.  Whether  the  city  or  the  visitor  is 
responsible  for  this,  whether  Paris  adopts  the 
visitor,  or  the  visitor  adapts  himself  to  his  sur- 
roundings, it  is  impossible  to  say.  But  there  is 
certainly  no  other  capital  of  the  world  in  which 
the  stranger  so  soon  takes  on  the  local  color,  in 
which  he  becomes  so  soon  acclimated,  and  which 


48  ABOUT   PARIS 

brings  to  light  in  him  so  many  new  and  unsus- 
pected capacities  for  enjoyment  and  adventure. 

Americans  go  to  London  for  social  triumph  or 
to  float  railroad  shares,  to  Rome  for  art's  sake, 
and  to  Berlin  to  study  music  and  to  economize; 
but  they  go  to  Paris  to  enjoy  themselves.  And 
there  are  no  young  men  of  any  nation  who  enter 
into  the  accomplishment  of  this  so  heartily  and 
so  completely  as  does  the  young  American.  It 
is  hardly  possible  for  the  English  youth  to  ap- 
preciate Paris  perfectly,  because  he  has  been 
brought  up  to  believe  that  "  one  Englishman 
can  thrash  three  Frenchmen,"  and  because  he 
holds  a  nation  that  talks  such  an  absurd  lan- 
guage in  some  contempt ;  hence  he  is  frequently 
while  there  irritable  and  rude,  and  jostles  men  at 
the  public  dances,  and  in  other  ways  asserts  his 
dignity. 

But  the  American  goes  to  Paris  as  though  re- 
turning to  his  inheritance  and  to  his  own  people. 
He  approaches  it  with  the  friendly  confidence  of 
a  child.  Its  language  holds  no  terrors  for  him  ; 
and  he  feels  himself  fully  equipped  if  he  can  ask 
for  his  "  edition,"  and  say,  "  Cocher,  allez  Hen- 
ry's tout  sweet."  There  is  nothing  so  joyous 
and  confiding  as  the  American  during  his  first 
visit  to  the   French   metropolis.     He  has  been 


THE  SHOW-PLACES   OF   PARIS  49 

told  by  older  men  of  the  gay,  glad  days  of  the 
Second  Empire,  and  by  his  college  chum  of  the 
summer  of  the  last  exposition,  and  he  enters  Paris 
determined  to  see  all  that  any  one  else  has  ever 
seen,  and  to  outdo  all  that  any  one  else  has  ever 
done,  and  to  stir  that  city  to  its  suburbs.  He 
saves  his  time,  his  money,  and  his  superfluous 
energy  for  this  visit,  and  the  most  amusing  part 
of  it  is  that  he  always  leaves  Paris  fully  assured 
that  he  has  enjoyed  himself  while  there  more 
thoroughly  than  any  one  else  has  ever  done,  and 
that  the  city  will  require  two  or  three  months' 
rest  before  it  can  readjust  itself  after  the  shock 
and  wonder  due  to  his  meteoric  flight  through 
its  limits,  London  he  dismisses  in  a  week  as  a 
place  in  which  you  can  get  good  clothes  at  mod- 
erate prices,  and  which  supports  some  very  en- 
tertaining music-halls ;  but  Paris,  he  tells  you, 
ecstatically,  when  he  meets  you  on  the  boulevards 
or  at  the  banker's,  where  he  is  drawing  grandly 
on  his  letter  of  credit,  is  "  the  greatest  place  on 
earth,"  and  he  adds,  as  evidence  of  the  truth  of 
this,  that  he  has  not  slept  in  three  weeks.  He 
is  unsurpassed  in  his  omnivorous  capacity  for 
sight-seeing,  and  in  his  ability  to  make  himself 
immediately  and  contentedly  at  home.  There 
is  a  story  which  illustrates  this  that  is  told  by  a 


50  ABOUT   PARIS 

young  American  banker  who  has  been  Hving  in 
Paris  for  the  last  six  years.  He  met  one  day  on 
the  boulevards  an  old  college  friend  of  his,  and 
welcomed  him  with  pleasure. 

"  You  must  let  me  be  your  guide,"  the  banker 
said.  "  I  have  been  here  so  long  now  that  I  know 
just  what  you  ought  to  see,  and  I  shall  enjoy 
seeing  it  with  you  as  much  as  though  it  were  for 
the  first  time.  When  did  you  come?"  The  new 
arrival  had  reached  Paris  only  three  days  before, 
and  said  that  he  was  ready  to  see  all  that  it  had 
to  show.  "  You  have  nothing  to  do  to-night, 
then  ?"  asked  the  banker.  *'  Well,  we  will  drop 
in  at  the  gardens  and  the  cafes  chantants.  There 
is  nothing  like  them  anywhere.''  His  friend  said 
he  had  made  the  tour  of  the  gardens  on  the  night 
of  his  arrival,  but  that  he  would  be  glad  to  re- 
visit them.  But  that  being  the  case,  the  banker 
would  rather  take  him  to  the  cafes — "  The  Black 
Cat,"  and  Bruant's,  and  "  The  Dead  Rat."  These 
his  friend  had  visited  on  his  second  evening. 

"  Oh,  well,  we  can  cross  the  river,  then,  and  I 
will  show  you  some  slumming,"  said  the  banker. 
"  You  should  see  the  places  where  the  thieves  go 
— the  Chateau  Rouge  and  Pere  Lunette." 

"I  went  there  last  night,"  said  the  new-comer. 

The  man  who  had  lived  six  years  in  Paris  took 


THE   SHOW-PLACES   OF   PARIS 


51 


the  stranger  by  the  arm  and  asked  him  if  he  was 
sure  he  was  not  engaged  for  that  evening.  "For 
if  you  are  not,"  he  said,  "you  might  take  me 
with  you  and  show  me  some  of  the  sights !" 

The  American  visitor  is  not  only  undaunted 
by  the  strange  language,  but  unimpressed  by  the 
signs  of  years  of  vivid  history  about  him.  He 
sandwiches  a  glimpse  at  the  tomb  of  Napoleon, 
and  a  trip  on  a  penny  steamer  up  the  Seine,  and 
back  again  to  the  Morgue,  with  a  rush  through 
the  Cathedral  of  Notre  Dame,  between  the  hours 
of  his  breakfast  and  the  race-meeting  at  Long- 
champs  the  same  afternoon.  Nothing  of  present 
interest  escapes  him,  and  nothing  bores  him.  He 
assimilates  and  grasps  the  method  of  Parisian  ex- 
istence with  a  rapidity  that  leaves  you  wonder- 
ing in  the  rear,  and  at  the  end  of  a  week  can  tell 
you  that  you  should  go  to  one  side  of  the  Grand 
Hotel  for  cigars,  and  to  the  other  to  have  your 
hat  blocked.  He  knows  at  what  hour  Yvette 
Guilbert  comes  on  at  the  Ambassadeurs',  and  on 
which  mornings  of  the  week  the  flower-market  is 
held  around  the  Madeleine.  While  you  are  still 
hunting  for  apartments  he  has  visited  the  sewers 
under  the  earth,  and  the  Eiffel  Tower  over  the 
earth,  and  eaten  his  dinner  in  a  tree  at  Robin- 
son's, and  driven  a  coach  to  Versailles  over  the 


52 


ABOUT    PARIS 


same  road  upon  which  the  mob  tramped  to  bring 
Marie  Antoinette  back  to  Paris,  without  being 
the  least  impressed  by  the  contrast  which  this 
offers  to  his  own  progress.  He  develops  also  a 
daring  and  reckless  spirit  of  adventure,  which 
would  never  have  found  vent  in  his  native  city 
or  town,  or  in  any  other  foreign  city  or  town.  It 
is  in  the  air,  and  he  enters  into  the  childish  good- 
nature of  the  place  and  of  the  people  after  the 
same  manner  that  the  head  of  a  family  grows 
young  again  at  his  class  reunion. 

One  Harvard  graduate  arrived  in  Paris  summer 
before  last  during  those  riots  which  originated 
with  the  students,  and  were  carried  on  by  the 
working-people,  and  which  were  cynically  spoken 
of  on  the  boulevards  as  the  Revolution  of  Sarah 
Brown.  In  any  other  city  he  would  have  watched 
these  ebullitions  from  the  outskirts  of  the  mob,  or 
remained  a  passive  spectator  of  what  did  not  con- 
cern him,  but  being  in  Paris,  and  for  the  first  time, 
he  mounted  a  barricade,  and  made  a  stirring  ad- 
dress to  the  students  behind  it  in  his  best  Har- 
vard French,  and  was  promptly  cut  over  the  head 
by  a  gendarme  and  conveyed  to  a  hospital,  where 
he  remained  during  his  stay  in  the  gay  metroplis. 
But  he  still  holds  that  Paris  is  the  finest  place 
that  he  has  ever  seen.    There  was  another  Amer- 


THE   SHOW-PLACES   OF   PARIS  53 

ican  youth  who  stood  up  suddenly  in  the  first 
row  of  seats  at  the  Nouveau  Cirque  and  wagered 
the  men  with  him  that  he  would  jump  into  the 
water  with  which  the  circus  ring  is  flooded  night- 
ly, and  swim,  "accoutred  as  he  was,"  to  the  other 
side.  They  promptly  took  him  at  his  word,  and 
the  audience  of  French  bourgeois  were  charmed 
by  the  spectacle  of  a  young  gentleman  in  evening 
dress  swimming  calmly  across  the  tank,  and  clam- 
bering leisurely  out  on  the  other  side.  He  was 
loudly  applauded  for  this,  and  the  management 
sent  the  "American  original"  home  in  a  fiacre. 
In  any  other  city  he  would  have  been  hustled  by 
the  ushers  and  handed  over  to  the  police. 

Those  show-places  of  Paris  which  are  seen  only 
at  night,  and  of  which  one  hears  the  most  fre- 
quently, are  curiously  few  in  number.  It  is  their 
quality  and  not  their  quantity  which  has  made 
them  talked  about.  It  is  quite  as  possible  to 
tell  off  on  the  fingers  of  two  hands  the  names  and 
the  places  to  which  the  visitor  to  Paris  will  be 
taken  as  it  is  quite  impossible  to  count  the  num- 
ber of  times  he  will  revisit  them. 

In  London  there  are  so  many  licensed  places 
of  amusement  that  a  man  might  visit  one  every 
night  for  a  year  and  never  enter  the  same  place 
twice,  and  those  of  unofficial  entertainment  are 


54  ABOUT    PARIS 

SO  numerous  that  men  spend  years  in  London 
and  never  hear  of  nooks  and  corners  in  it  as 
odd  and  strange  as  Stevenson's  Suicide  Club  or 
Pagan's  School  for  Thieves — public-houses  where 
blind  beggars  regain  their  sight  and  the  halt  and 
lame  walk  and  dance,  music-halls  where  the  line 
is  strictly  drawn  between  the  gentleman  who 
smokes  a  clay  pipe  and  the  one  who  smokes  a 
brier,  and  arenas  like  the  Lambeth  School  of 
Arms,  from  which  boy  pugilists  and  coal-heavers 
graduate  to  the  prize-ring,  and  such  thorough- 
fares as  Ship's  Alley,  where  in  the  space  of  fifty 
yards  twenty  murders  have  occurred  in  three 
years. 

In  Paris  there  are  virtually  no  slums  at  all. 
The  dangerous  classes  are  there,  and  there  is  an 
army  of  beggars  and  wretches  as  poor  and  brutal 
as  are  to  be  found  at  large  in  any  part  of  the 
world,  but  the  Parisian  criminal  has  no  environ- 
ment, no  setting.  He  plays  the  part  quite  as 
effectively  as  does  the  London  or  New  York 
criminal,  but  he  has  no  appropriate  scenery  or 
mechanical  effects. 

If  he  wishes  to  commit  murder,  he  is  forced  to 
make  the  best  of  the  well-paved,  well-lighted,  and 
cleanly  swept  avenue.  He  cannot  choose  a  laby- 
rinth of  alleyways  and  covered  passages,  as  he 


THE   SHOW-PLACES   OF   PARIS  55 

could  were  he  in  Whitechapel,  or  a  net-work  of 
tenements  and  narrow  side  streets,  as  he  could 
were  he  in  the  city  of  New  York. 

Young  men  who  have  spent  a  couple  of  weeks 
in  Paris,  and  who  have  been  taken  slumming  by- 
paid  guides,  may  possibly  question  the  accuracy 
of  this.  They  saw  some  very  awful  places  indeed 
— one  place  they  remember  in  particular,  called 
the  Chateau  Rouge,  and  another  called  Pere  Lu- 
nette. The  reason  they  so  particularly  remember 
these  two  places  is  that  these  are  the  only  two 
places  any  one  ever  sees,  and  they  do  not  recall 
the  fact  that  the  neighboring  houses  were  of 
hopeless  respectability,  and  that  they  were  able 
to  pick  up  a  cab  within  a  hundred  yards  of  these 
houses.  Young  Frenchmen  who  know  all  the 
worlds  of  Paris  tell  you  mysteriously  of  these 
places,  and  of  how  they  visited  them  disguised  in 
blue  smocks  and  guarded  by  detectives  ;  detec- 
tives themselves  speak  to  you  of  them  as  a  fisher- 
man speaks  to  you  of  a  favorite  rock  or  a  deep 
hole  where  you  can  always  count  on  finding  fish, 
and  every  newspaper  correspondent  who  visits 
Paris  for  the  first  time  writes  home  of  them  as 
typical  of  Parisian  low  life.  They  are  as  typical 
of  Parisian  low  life  as  the  animals  in  the  Zoo  in 
Central  Park  are  typical  of  the  other  animals  we 


56  ABOUT   PARIS 

see  drawing  stages  and  horse-cars  and  broughams 
on  the  city  streets,  and  you  require  the  guardian- 
ship of  a  detective  when  you  visit  them  as  much  as 
you  would  need  a  policeman  in  Mulberry  Bend  or 
at  an  organ  recital  in  Carnegie  Hall.  They  are 
show-places,  or  at  least  they  have  become  so,  and 
though  they  would  no  doubt  exist  without  the 
aid  of  the  tourist  or  the  man  about  town  of  in- 
trepid spirit,  they  count  upon  him,  and  are  pre- 
pared for  him  with  set  speeches,  and  are  as  ready 
to  show  him  all  that  there  is  to  see  as  are  the 
guides  around  the  Capitol  at  Washington. 

I  should  not  wish  to  be  misunderstood  as  say- 
ing that  these  are  the  only  abodes  of  poverty  and 
the  only  meeting-places  for  criminals  in  Paris, 
which  would  of  course  be  absurd,  but  they  are 
the  only  places  of  such  interest  that  the  visitor 
sees.  There  are  other  places,  chiefly  wine-shops 
in  cellars  in  the  districts  of  la  Glaciere,  Mont- 
rouge,  or  la  Villette,  but  unless  an  inspector  of 
police  leads  you  to  them,  and  points  out  such 
and  such  men  as  thieves,  you  would  not  be  able 
to  distinguish  any  difference  between  them  and 
the  wine-shops  and  their  habitues  north  of  the 
bridges  and  within  sound  of  the  boulevards. 
The  paternal  municipality  of  Paris,  and  the 
thought  it  has  spent  in  laying  out  the  streets, 


THE   SHOW-PLACES   OF   PARIS  57 

and  the  generous  manner  in  which  it  has  Hghted 
them,  are  responsible  for  the  lack  of  slums. 
Houses  of  white  stucco,  and  broad,  cleanly 
swept  boulevards  with  double  lines  of  gas  lamps 
and  shade  trees,  extend,  without  consideration 
for  the  criminal,  to  the  fortifications  and  be- 
yond, and  the  thief  and  bully  whose  interests 
are  so  little  regarded  is  forced  in  consequence  to 
hide  himself  underground  in  cellars  or  in  the 
dark  shadows  of  the  Bois  de  Boulogne  at  night. 
This  used  to  appeal  to  me  as  one  of  the  most 
peculiar  characteristics  of  Paris — that  the  most 
desperate  poverty  and  the  most  heartless  of 
crimes  continued  in  neighborhoods  notorious 
chiefly  for  their  wickedness,  and  yet  which  were 
in  appearance  as  well-ordered  and  commonplace- 
looking  as  the  new  model  tenements  in  Harlem 
or  the  trim  working-men's  homes  in  the  factory 
districts  of  Philadelphia. 

The  Chateau  Rouge  w^as  originally  the  house 
of  some  stately  family  in  the  time  of  Louis 
XIV.  They  will  tell  you  there  that  it  was  one 
of  the  mistresses  of  this  monarch  who  occupied 
it,  and  will  point  to  the  frescos  of  one  room  to 
show  how  magnificent  her  abode  then  was.  This 
tradition  may  or  may  not  be  true,  but  it  adds  an 
interest  to  the  house,  and  furnishes  the  dramatic 


58  ABOUT   PARIS 

contrast  to  its  present  wretchedness.  It  is  a  tall 
building  painted  red,  and  set  back  from  the 
street  in  a  court.  There  are  four  rooms  filled 
with  deal  tables  on  the  first  floor,  and  a  long 
counter  with  the  usual  leaden  top.  Whoever 
buys  a  glass  of  wine  here  may  sleep  with  his  or 
her  head  on  the  table,  or  lie  at  length  up-stairs 
on  the  floor  of  that  room  where  one  still  sees  the 
stucco  cupids  of  the  fine  lady's  boudoir.  It  is 
now  a  lodging-house  for  beggars  and  for  those 
who  collect  the  ends  of  castaway  cigars  and  ci- 
garettes on  the  boulevards,  and  possibly  for 
those  who  thieve  in  a  small  way.  By  ten  o'clock 
each  night  the  place  is  filled  with  men  and 
women  sleeping  heavily  at  the  tables,  with  their 
heads  on  their  arms,  or  gathered  together  for 
miserable  company,  whispering  and  gossiping, 
each  sipping  jealously  of  his  glass  of  red  wine. 

There  is  a  little  room  at  the  rear,  the  walls  of 
which  are  painted  with  scenes  of  celebrated  mur- 
ders, and  the  portraits  of  the  murderers,  of  an- 
archists, and  of  their  foes  the  police.  A  sharp- 
faced  boy  points  to  these  with  his  cap,  and 
recites  his  lesson  in  a  high  singsong,  and  in  an 
argot  which  makes  all  he  says  quite  unintelligi- 
ble. He  is  interesting  chiefly  because  the  men 
of  whom  he  speaks  are  heroes  to  him,  and  he 


e^fffil 


THE   SHOW-PLACES   OF   PARIS  6l 

roars  forth  the  name  of  "  Antoine,  who  mur- 
dered the  poHceman  Jervois,"  as  though  he  were 
saying  Gambetta,  the  founder  of  the  repubhc, 
and  with  the  innocent  confidence  that  you  will 
share  with  him  in  his  enthusiasm.  The  pictures 
are  ghastly  things,  in  which  the  artist  has  chiefly 
done  himself  honor  in  the  generous  use  of  scar- 
let paint  for  blood,  and  in  the  way  he  has  shown 
how  by  rapid  gradations  the  criminal  descends 
from  well-dressed  innocence  to  ragged  vicious- 
ness,  until  he  reaches  the  steps  of  the  guillotine 
at  Roquette.  It  is  a  miserable  chamber  of  hor- 
rors, in  which  the  heavy-eyed  absinthe-drinkers 
raise  their  heads  to  stare  mistily  at  the  visitor, 
and  to  listen  for  the  hundredth  time  to  the 
boy's  glib  explanation  of  each  daub  in  the  gal- 
lery around  them,  from  the  picture  of  the  ver- 
milion -  cheeked  young  woman  who  caused  the 
trouble,  to  an  imaginative  picture  of  Montfaucon 
covered  with  skulls,  where,  many  years  in  the 
past,  criminals  swung  in  chains. 

The  cafe  of  Pere  Lunette  is  just  around  sev- 
eral sharp  corners  from  the  Chateau  Rouge.  It 
was  originally  presided  over  by  an  old  gentle- 
man who  wore  spectacles,  which  gave  his  shop 
its  name.  It  is  a  resort  of  the  lowest  class  of 
women    and    men,    and    its    walls    are    painted 


62  ABOUT   PARIS 

throughout  with  faces  and  scenes  a  little  better 
in  execution  than  those  in  the  Chateau  Rouge, 
and  a  little  worse  in  subject.  It  is  a  very  small 
place  to  enjoy  so  wide-spread  a  reputation,  and 
its  front  room  is  uninteresting,  save  for  a  row  of 
casks  resting  on  their  sides,  on  the  head  of  each 
of  which  is  painted  the  portrait  of  some  noted 
Parisian,  like  Zola,  Eiffel,  or  Boulanger.  The 
young  proprietor  fell  upon  us  as  his  natural  prey 
the  night  we  visited  the  place,  and  drove  us  be- 
fore him  into  a  room  in  the  rear  of  the  wine- 
shop. He  was  followed  as  a  matter  of  course  by 
a  dozen  men  in  blouses,  and  as  many  bareheaded 
women,  who  placed  themselves  expectantly  at 
the  deal  tables,  and  signified  what  it  was  they 
wished  to  drink  before  going  through  the  form 
of  asking  us  if  we  meant  to  pay  for  it.  They 
were  as  ready  to  do  their  part  of  the  entertain- 
ment as  the  actors  of  the  theatre  are  ready  to  go 
on  when  the  curtain  rises,  and  there  was  noth- 
ing about  any  of  them  to  suggest  that  he  or  she 
was  there  for  any  other  reason  than  the  hope  of 
a  windfall  in  the  person  of  a  stranger  who  would 
supply  him  or  her  with  money  or  liquor.  A 
long-haired  boy  with  a  three  days'  growth  of 
hair  upon  his  chin,  of  whom  the  proprietor 
spoke  proudly  as  a  poet,  recited  in  verse  a  long 


THE  SHOW-PLACES   OF   PARIS  63 

descriptive  story  of  what  the  pictures  on  the 
wall  were  intended  to  represent,  and  another 
youth,  with  a  Vandyck  beard  and  slouched  hat, 
and  curls  hanging  to  his  shoulder,  sang  Aristide 
Bruant's  song  of  "  Saint  Lazare."  All  of  the 
women  of  the  place  belonged  to  the  class  which 
spends  many  months  of  each  year  in  that  prison. 
The  music  of  the  song  is  in  a  minor  key,  and  is 
strangely  sad  and  eerie.  It  is  the  plaint  of  a  young 
girl  writing  to  her  lover  from  within  the  walls  of 
the  prison,  begging  him  to  be  faithful  to  her 
while  she  is  gone,  and  Bruant  cynically  makes 
her  designate  three  or  four  feminine  friends  as 
those  whose  society  she  particularly  desires  him 
to  avoid.  The  women,  all  of  whom  sang  with 
sodden  seriousness,  may  not  have  appreciated 
how  well  the  words  of  the  song  applied  to  them- 
selves, but  you  could  imagine  that  they  did,  and 
this  gave  to  the  moment  and  the  scene  a  certain 
touch  of  interest.  Apart  from  this  the  place  was 
dreary,  and  the  pictures  indecent  and  stupid. 

There  is  much  more  of  interest  in  the  Cafe 
of  Aristide  Bruant,  on  the  Boulevard  Roche- 
chouart.  Bruant  is  the  modern  Francois  Villon. 
He  is  the  poet  of  the  people,  and  more  espe- 
cially of  the  criminal  classes.  He  sings  the  virt- 
ues or  the  lack  of  virtue  of  the  several  districts 


64  ABOUT  PARIS 

of  Paris,  with  the  Hfe  of  which  he  claims  an  in- 
timate famih'arity.  He  is  the  bard  of  the  bully, 
and  of  the  thief,  and  of  the  men  who  live  on 
the  earnings  of  women.  He  is  unquestionably 
one  of  the  most  picturesque  figures  in  Paris, 
but  his  picturesqueness  is  spoiled  in  some  de- 
gree by  the  evident  fact  that  he  is  conscious  of 
it.  He  is  a  poet,  but  he  is  very  much  more  of 
a  pose  117'. 

Bruant  began  by  singing  his  own  songs  in 
the  cafe  chantant  in  the  Champs  Elysees,  and 
celebrating  in  them  the  life  of  Montmartre 
and  the  Place  de  la  Republique,  and  of  the 
Bastille.  He  has  done  for  the  Parisian  bully 
what  Albert  Chevallier  has  done  for  the  coster 
of  Whitechapel,  and  Edward  Harrigan  for  the 
East  Side  of  New  York,  but  with  the  important 
difference  that  the  Frenchman  claims  to  be  one 
of  the  class  of  whom  he  writes,  and  the  audac- 
ity with  which  he  robs  stray  visitors  to  his  cafe 
would  seem  to  justify  his  claims.  There  is  no 
question  as  to  the  strength  in  his  poems,  nor 
that  he  gives  you  the  spirit  of  the  places  which 
he  describes,  and  that  he  sees  whatever  is  dra- 
matic and  characteristic  in  them.  But  the  utter 
heartlessness  with  which  he  writes  of  the  wick- 
edness of  his  friends  the  souteneurs  rings  false, 


THE   SHOW-PLACES   OF   PARIS  6/ 

and  sounds  like  an  affectation.  One  of  the 
best  specimens  of  his  verse  is  that  in  which 
he  tells  of  the  Bois  de  Boulogne  at  night,  when 
the  woods,  he  says,  cloak  all  manner  of  evil 
things,  and  when,  instead  of  the  rustling  of  the 
leaves,  you  hear  the  groans  of  the  homeless  toss- 
ing in  their  sleep  under  the  sky,  and  calls  for 
help  suddenly  hushed,  and  the  angry  cries  of 
thieves  who  have  fallen  out  over  their  spoils 
and  who  fight  among  themselves  ;  or  the  hurried 
footsteps  of  a  belated  old  gentleman  hastening 
home,  and  followed  silently  in  the  shadow  of  the 
trees  by  men  who  fall  upon  and  rob  him  after 
the  fashion  invented  and  perfected  by  le  Pere 
Francois.  Others  of  his  poems  are  like  the 
most  realistic  paragraphs  of  L Assoiiinwir  and 
Nana  put  into  verse. 

Bruant  himself  is  a  young  man,  and  an  ex- 
tremely handsome  one.  He  w^ears  his  yellow 
hair  separated  in  the  middle  and  combed 
smoothly  back  over  his  ears,  and  dresses  at  all 
times  in  brown  velvet,  with  trousers  tucked  in 
high  boots,  and  a  red  shirt  and  broad  sombrero. 
He  has  had  the  compliment  paid  him  of  the 
most  sincere  imitation,  for  a  young  man  made 
up  to  look  exactly  like  him  now  sings  his  songs 
in  the  cafes,  even  the  characteristically  modest 


68  ABOUT   PARIS 

one  in  which  Bruant  slaps  his  chest  and  exclaims 
at  the  end  of  each  verse  :  "  And  I  ?  I  am  Bru- 
ant." The  real  Bruant  sings  every  night  in  his 
own  cafe,  but  as  his  under-study  at  the  Ambas- 
sadeurs'  is  frequently  mistaken  for  him,  he  may 
be  said  to  have  accomplished  the  rather  difificult 
task  of  being  in  two  places  at  once. 

Bruant's  cafe  is  a  little  shop  barred  and  black 
without,  and  guarded  by  a  commissionnaire  dress- 
ed to  represent  a  policeman.  If  you  desire  to  en- 
ter, this  man  raps  on  the  door,  and  Bruant,  when 
he  is  quite  ready,  pushes  back  a  little  panel,  and 
scrutinizes  the  visitor  through  the  grated  open- 
ing. If  he  approves  of  you  he  unbars  the  door, 
with  much  jangling  of  chains  and  rasping  of 
locks,  and  you  enter  a  tiny  shop,  filled  with 
three  long  tables,  and  hung  with  all  that  is  ab- 
surd and  fantastic  in  decoration,  from  Cheret's 
bill-posters  to  unframed  oil-paintings,  and  from 
beer-mugs  to  plaster  death-masks.  There  is  a 
different  salutation  for  every  one  who  enters 
this  cafe,  in  which  all  those  already  in  the  place 
join  in  chorus.  A  woman  is  greeted  by  a  certain 
burst  of  melody,  and  a  man  by  another,  and  a 
soldier  with  easy  satire,  as  representing  the  gov- 
ernment, by  an  imitation  of  the  fanfare  which  is 
blown  by  the  trumpeters  whenever  the  President 


THE   SHOW-PLACES   OF   PARIS  69 

appears  in  public.  There  did  not  seem  to  be 
any  greeting  which  exactly  fitted  our  case,  so 
Bruant  waved  us  to  a  bench,  and  explained  to 
his  guests,  with  a  shrug :  "  These  are.  two  gentle- 
men from  the  boulevards  who  have  come  to  see 
the  thieves  of  Montmartre.  If  they  are  quiet 
and  well-behaved  we  will  not  rob  them."  After 
this  somewhat  discouraging  reception  we,  in  our 
innocence,  sat  perfectly  still,  and  tried  to  think 
we  were  enjoying  ourselves,  while  we  allowed 
ourselves  to  be  robbed  by  waiters  and  venders 
of  songs  and  books  without  daring  to  murmur  or 
protest. 

Bruant  is  assisted  in  the  entertainment  of  his 
guests  by  two  or  three  young  men  who  sing  his 
songs,  the  others  in  the  room  joining  with  them. 
Every  third  number  is  sung  by  the  great  man 
himself,  swaggering  up  and  down  the  narrow 
limits  of  the  place,  with  his  hands  sunk  deep  in 
the  pockets  of  his  coat,  and  his  head  rolling  on 
his  shoulders.  At  the  end  of  each  verse  he  with- 
draws his  hands,  and  brushes  his  hair  back  over 
his  ears,  and  shakes  it  out  like  a  mane.  One  of 
his  perquisites  as  host  is  the  privilege  of  saluting 
all  of  the  women  as  they  leave,  of  which  privi- 
lege he  avails  himself  when  they  are  pretty,  or 
resigns  it  and  bows  gravely  when  they  are  not. 


70  ABOUT   PARIS 

It  is  amusing  to  notice  how  the  different  women 
approach  the  door  when  it  is  time  to  go,  and 
how  the  escort  of  each  smiles  proudly  when  the 
young  man  deigns  to  bend  his  head  over  the  lips 
of  the  girl  and  kiss  her  good-night. 

The  cafe  of  the  Black  Cat  is  much  finer  and 
much  more  pretentious  than  Bruant's  shop,  and 
is  of  wider  fame.  It  is,  indeed,  of  an  entirely 
different  class,  but  it  comes  in  here  under  the 
head  of  the  show- places  of  Paris  at  night.  It 
was  originally  a  sort  of  club  where  journalists 
and  artists  and  poets  met  round  the  tables  of 
a  restaurant -keeper  who  happened  to  be  a  pa- 
tron of  art  as  well,  and  fitted  out  his  caf6  with 
the  canvases  of  his  customers,  and  adopted  their 
suggestions  in  the  arrangement  of  its  decoration. 
The  outside  world  of  Paris  heard  of  these  gath- 
erings at  the  Black  Cat,  as  the  cafe  and  club 
were  called,  and  of  the  wit  and  spirit  of  its  ha- 
bitues, and  sought  admittance  to  its  meetings, 
which  was  at  first  granted  as  a  great  privilege. 
But  at  the  present  day  the  cafe  has  been  turned 
over  into  other  hands,  and  is  a  show-place  pure 
and  simple,  and  a  most  interesting  one.  The 
cafe  proper  is  fitted  throughout  with  heavy  black 
oak,  or  something  in  imitation  of  it.  There  are 
heavy  broad  tables  and  high  wainscoting  and  an 


THE    SHOW-PLACES  OF   PARIS  73 

immense  fireplace  and  massive  rafters.  To  set 
off  the  sombreness  of  this,  the  walls  are  covered 
with  panels  in  the  richest  of  colors,  by  Steinlen, 
the  most  imaginative  and  original  of  the  Parisian 
illustrators,  in  all  of  which  the  black  cat  appears 
as  a  subject,  but  in  a  different  role  and  with  sep- 
arate treatment.  Upon  one  panel  hundreds  of 
black  cats  race  over  the  ocean,  in  another  they 
are  waltzing  with  naiads  in  the  woods,  and  in 
another  they  are  whirling  through  space  over 
red  -  tiled  roofs,  followed  by  beautiful  young 
women,  gendarmes,  and  boulevardiers  in  hot 
pursuit.  And  in  every  other  part  of  the  cafe 
the  black  cat  appears  as  frequently  as  did  the 
head  of  Charles  I.  in  the  writings  of  Mr.  Dick. 
It  stalks  stuffed  in  its  natural  skin,  or  carved  in 
wood,  with  round  glass  eyes  and  long  red  tongue, 
or  it  perches  upon  the  chimney-piece  with  back 
arched  and  tail  erect,  peering  down  from  among 
the  pewter  pots  and  salvers.  The  gas-jets  shoot 
from  the  mouths  of  wrought-iron  cats,  and  the 
dismembered  heads  of  others  grin  out  into  the 
night  from  the  stained-glass  windows.  The  room 
shows  the  struggle  for  what  is  odd  and  bizarre,  but 
the  drawings  in  black  and  white  and  the  water- 
colors  and  oil-paintings  on  the  walls  are  signed  by 
some  of  the  cleverest  artists  in  Paris.    The  inscrip- 


74  "         ABOUT   PARIS 

tions  and  rules  and  regulations  are  as  odd  as  the 
decorations.  As,  for  example,  the  one  placed  half- 
way up  the  narrow  flight  of  stairs  which  leads  to 
the  tiny  theatre,  and  which  commemorates  the 
fact  that  the  cafe  was  on  such  a  night  visited  by 
President  Carnot,  who — so  the  inscription  adds, 
lest  the  visitor  should  suppose  the  Black  Cat 
was  at  all  impressed  by  the  honor — "  is  the  suc- 
cessor of  Charlemagne  and  Napoleon  I."  An- 
other fancy  of  the  Black  Cat  was  at  one  time  to 
dress  all  the  waiters  in  the  green  coat  and  gold 
olive  leaves  of  the  members  of  the  Institute,  to 
show  how  little  the  poets  and  artists  of  the  cafe 
thought  of  the  other  artists  and  poets  who  be- 
longed to  that  ancient  institution  across  the 
bridges.  But  this  has  now  been  given  up,  either 
because  the  uniforms  proved  too  expensive,  or 
because  some  one  of  the  Black  Cat's  habitue's 
had  left  his  friends  "  for  a  ribbon  to  wear  in  his 
coat,"  and  so  spoiled  the  satire. 

Three  times  a  week  there  is  a  performance  in 
the  theatre  up-stairs,  at  which  poets  of  the  neigh- 
borhood recite  their  own  verses,  and  some  clever 
individual  tells  a  story,  with  a  stereopticon  and  a 
caste  of  pasteboard  actors  for  accessories.  These 
latter  little  plays  are  very  clever  and  well  ar- 
ranged, and  as  nearly  proper  as  a   Frenchman 


THE   SHOW-PLACES   OF   PARIS  75 

with  such  a  temptation  to  be  otherwise  could  be 
expected  to  make  them.  It  is  a  most  informal 
gathering,  more  Hke  a  performance  in  a  private 
house  than  a  theatre,  and  the  most  curious  thing 
about  it  is  the  character  of  the  audience,  which, 
instead  of  being  bohemian  and  artistic,  is  com- 
posed chiefly  of  worthy  bourgeoisie,  and  young 
men  and  young  women  properly  chaperoned  by 
the  parents  of  each.  They  sit  on  very  stiff  wood- 
en chairs,  while  a  young  man  stands  on  the  floor 
in  front  of  them  with  his  arms  comfortably  fold- 
ed and  recites  a  poem  or  a  monologue,  or  plays  a 
composition  of  his  own.  And  then  the  lights  are 
all  put  out,  and  a  tiny  curtain  is  rung  up,  show- 
ing a  square  hole  in  the  proscenium,  covered  with 
a  curtain  of  white  linen.  On  this  are  thrown 
the  shadows  of  the  pasteboard  figures,  who  do 
the  most  remarkable  things  with  a  naturalness 
which  might  well  shame  some  living  actors. 

It  would  be  impossible  to  write  of  the  enter- 
tainment Paris  affords  at  night  without  cata- 
loguing the  open-air  concerts  and  the  public  gar- 
dens and  dance -halls.  The  best  of  the  cafes 
chantants  in  Paris  is  the  Ambassadeurs'.  There 
are  many  others,  but  the  Ambassadeurs'  is  the 
best  known,  is  nearest  to  the  boulevards,  and  has 
the  best  restaurant.     It  is  like  all  the  rest  in  its 


']6  ABOUT   PARIS 

general  arrangement,  or  all  the  others  copy  it,  so 
that  what  is  true  of  the  Ambassadeurs'  may  be 
considered  as  descriptive  of  them  all. 

The  Ambassadeurs'  is  a  roof -garden  on  the 
ground,  except  that  there  are  comfortable  bench- 
es instead  of  tables  with  chairs  about  them,  and 
that  there  is  gravel  underfoot  in  place  of  wooden 
flooring.  Lining  the  block  of  benches  on  either 
side  are  rows  of  boxes,  and  at  the  extreme  rear 
is  the  restaurant,  with  a  wide  balcony,  where 
people  sit  and  dine,  and  listen  to  the  music  of 
the  songs  without  running  any  risk  of  hearing 
the  words.  The  stage  is  shut  in  with  mirrors 
and  set  with  artificial  flowers,  which  make  a  bad 
background  for  the  artists,  and  which  at  mati- 
nees, in  the  broad  sunlight,  look  very  ghastly  in- 
deed. But  at  night,  when  all  the  gas-jets  are  lit 
and  the  place  is  crowded,  it  is  very  gay,  joyous, 
and  pretty. 

The  Parisian  may  economize  in  household  mat 
ters,  in  the  question  of  another  Q.g^  for  his  break- 
fast, and  in  the  turning  of  an  uneaten  entree  into 
a  soup,  but  in  public  he  is  most  generous  ;  and  he 
is  in  nothing  so  generous  as  in  his  reckless  use  of 
gas.  He  raises  ten  lamp-posts  to  every  one  that 
is  put  up  in  London  or  New  York,  and  he  does 
not  plant  them  only  to  light  some  thing  or  some 


THE   SHOW-PLACES   OF   PARIS  79 

person,  but  because  they  are  pleasing  to  look  at 
in  themselves.  It  is  difficult  to  feel  gloomy  in  a 
city  which  is  so  genuinely  illuminated  that  one 
can  sit  in  the  third-story  window  of  a  hotel  and 
read  a  newspaper  by  the  glare  of  the  gas-lamps 
in  the  street  below.  This  is  a  very  wise  gener- 
osity, for  it  helps  to  attract  people  to  Paris,  who 
spend  money  there,  so  that  in  the  end  the  light- 
ing of  the  city  may  be  said  to  pay  for  itself.  If 
we  had  as  good  government  in  New  York  as  there 
is  in  Paris,  Madison  Square  would  not  depend  for 
its  brilliancy  at  night  on  the  illuminated  adver- 
tising of  two  business  firms. 

Individuals  follow  the  municipality  of  Paris  in 
this  extravagance,  and  the  Ambassadeurs'  is  in 
consequence  as  brilliant  as  many  rows  of  gas- 
jets  can  make  it,  and  these  globes  of  white  light 
among  the  green  branches  of  the  trees  are  one 
of  the  prettiest  effects  on  the  Champs  Elysees  at 
night.  They  do  not  turn  night  into  day,  but 
they  make  the  darkness  itself  more  attractive  by 
contrast.  The  performers  at  the  Ambassadeurs' 
are  the  best  in  their  line  of  work,  and  the  audi- 
ences are  composed  of  what  in  London  would  be 
called  the  middle  class,  mixed  with  cocottes  and 
boulevardiers.  You  will  also  often  see  American 
men  and  women  who  are  well  known  at  home 


8o  ABOUT   PARIS 

dining  there  on  the  balcony,  but  they  do  not 
bring  young  girls  with  them. 

It  is  interesting  to  note  what  pleases  French 
people  of  the  class  who  gather  at  these  open-air 
concerts.  What  is  artistic  they  seem  to  appre- 
ciate much  more  fully  than  would  an  American 
or  an  English  audience — at  least,  they  are  more 
demonstrative  in  their  applause ;  but  the  contra- 
dictory feature  of  their  appreciation  lies  in  their 
delight  and  boisterous  enthusiasm,  not  only  over 
what  is  very  good,  but  also  over  what  is  most 
childish  horse-play.  They  enjoy  with  equal  zest 
the  quiet,  inimitable  character  studies  of  Nicolle 
and  the  efforts  of  two  trained  dogs  to  play  upon 
a  fiddle,  while  a  hideous,  gaunt  creature,  six  foot 
tall,  in  a  woman's  ballet  costume,  throws  them 
off  their  chairs  in  convulsions  of  delight.  They 
are  like  children  with  a  mature  sense  of  the  artis- 
tic, and  still  with  an  infantile  delight  in  what  is 
merely  noisy  and  absurd. 

It  is  also  interesting  to  note  how  much  these 
audiences  will  permit  from  the  stage  in  the  di- 
rection of  suggestiveness,  and  what  would  be 
called  elsewhere  '*  outraged  propriety."  This  is 
furnished  them  to  the  highest  degree  by  Yvette 
Guilbert.  It  seems  that  as  this  artist  became 
less  of  a  novelty,  she  recognized  that  it  would  be 


I 


THE   SHOW-PLACES   OF   PARIS  01 

necessary  for  her  to  increase  the  audacity  of  her 
songs  if  she  meant  to  hold  her  original  place  in 
the  interest  of  her  audiences,  and  she  has  now 
reached  a  point  in  daring  which  seems  hardly 
possible  for  her  or  any  one  else  to  pass.  No  one 
can  help  delighting  in  her  and  in  her  line  of 
work,  in  her  subtlety,  her  grace,  and  the  abso- 
lute knowledge  she  possesses  of  what  she  wants 
to  do  and  how  to  do  it.  But  her  songs  are  be- 
yond anything  that  one  finds  in  the  most  impos- 
sible of  French  novels  or  among  the  legends  of 
the  Viennese  illustrated  papers.  These  latter 
may  treat  of  certain  subjects  in  a  too  realistic  or 
in  a  scoffing  but  amusing  manner,  but  Guilbert 
talks  of  things  which  are  limited  generally  to 
the  clinique  of  a  hospital  and  the  blague  of  med- 
ical students  ;  things  which  are  neither  funny, 
witty,  nor  quaint,  but  simply  nasty  and  offensive. 
The  French  audiences  of  the  open-air  concerts, 
however,  enjoy  these,  and  encore  her  six  times 
nightly.  At  Pastor's  Theatre  last  year  a  French 
girl  sang  a  song  which  probably  not  one  out  of 
three  hundred  in  the  audience  understood,  but 
which  she  delivered  with  such  appropriateness  of 
gesture  as  to  make  her  meaning  plain.  When 
she  left  the  stage  there  was  absolute  silence  in 
the  house,  and  in  the  wings  the  horrified  man- 


82  ABOUT   PARIS 

ager  seized  her  by  the  arms,  and  in  spite  of  her 
protests  refused  to  allow  her  to  reappear.  So 
her  performance  in  this  country  was  Hmited  to 
that  one  song.  It  was  a  very  long  trip  to  take 
for  such  a  disappointment,  and  the  management 
were,  of  course,  to  blame  for  not  knowing  what 
they  wanted  and  what  their  audiences  did  not 
want,  but  the  incident  is  interesting  as  showing 
how  widely  an  American  and  a  French  audience 
differs  in  matters  of  this  sort. 

There  was  another  Frenchwoman  who  ap- 
peared in  New  York  last  winter,  named  Duclerc. 
She  is  a  very  beautiful  woman,  and  very  popular 
in  Paris,  and  I  used  to  think  her  amusing  at  the 
Ambassadeurs',  where  she  appealed  to  a  sympa- 
thetic audience ;  but  in  a  New  York  theatre  she 
gave  you  a  sense  of  personal  responsibility  that 
sent  cold  shivers  down  your  back,  and  you  lacked 
the  courage  to  applaud,  when  even  the  gallery 
looked  on  with  sullen  disapproval.  And  when 
the  Irish  comedian  who  followed  her  said  that  he 
did  not  understand  her  song,  but  that  she  was 
quite  right  to  sing  it  under  an  umbrella,  there 
was  a  roar  of  relief  from  the  audience  which 
showed  it  wanted  some  one  to  express  its  senti- 
ments, which  it  had  been  too  polite  to  do  except 
in  silence.      This  tolerance  impressed  me  very 


THE   SHOW-PLACES   OF   PARIS  85 

much,  especially  because  I  had  seen  the  same 
woman  suffer  at  the  hands  of  her  own  people, 
whom  she  had  chanced  to  offend.  The  incident 
is  interesting,  perhaps,  as  showing  that  the  French 
have  at  times  not  only  the  child's  quick  delight, 
but  also  the  cruelty  of  a  child,  than  which  there 
is  nothing  more  unreasoning  and  nothing  more 
savage. 

One  night  at  the  Ambassadeurs',  when  Duclerc 
had  finished  the  first  verse  of  her  song,  a  man 
rose  suddenly  in  the  front  row  of  seats  and  in- 
sulted her.  Had  he  used  the  same  words  in  any 
American  or  English  theatre,  he  would  have  been 
hit  over  the  head  by  the  member  of  the  orches- 
tra nearest  him,  and  then  thrown  out  of  the  the- 
atre into  the  street.  It  appeared  from  this  man's 
remarks  that  the  actress  had  formerly  cared  for 
him,  but  that  she  had  ceased  to  do  so,  and  that 
he  had  come  there  that  night  to  show  her  ho\^ 
well  he  could  stand  such  treatment.  He  did  this 
by  bringing  another  woman  with  him,  and  by 
placing  a  dozen  bullies  from  Montmartre  among 
the  audience  to  hiss  the  actress  when  she  ap- 
peared. This  they  did  with  a  rare  good  -  will, 
while  the  rejected  suitor  in  the  front  row  con- 
tinued to  insult  her,  assisted  at  the  same  time  by 
his  feminine  companion.     No  one  in  the  audi- 


86  ABOUT   PARIS 

ence  seemed  to  heed  this,  or  to  look  upon  it  as 
unfair  to  himself  or  to  the  actress,  who  was  be- 
coming visibly  hysterical.  There  was  a  piece  of 
wood  lying  on  the  stage  that  had  been  used  in 
a  previous  act,  and  Duclerc,  in  a  frenzy  at  a 
word  which  the  man  finally  called  to  her,  sud- 
denly stooped,  and,  picking  this  up,  hurled  it 
at  him.  In  an  instant  the  entire  audience  was 
on  its  feet.  This  last  was  an  insult  to  itself.  As 
long  as  it  was  Duclerc  who  was  being  attacked, 
it  did  not  feel  nor  show  any  responsibility,  but 
when  she  dared  to  hurl  sticks  of  wood  at  the 
face  of  a  Parisian  audience,  it  rose  in  its  might 
and  shouted  its  indignation.  Under  the  cover 
of  this  confusion  the  hired  bullies  stooped,  and, 
scooping  up  handfuls  of  the  gravel  with  which 
the  place  is  strewn,  hurled  them  at  Duclerc,  un- 
til the  stones  rattled  around  her  on  the  stage 
like  a  fall  of  hail.  She  showed  herself  a  very 
plucky  woman,  and  continued  her  song,  even 
though  you  could  see  her  face  growing  white 
beneath  the  rouge,  and  her  legs  twisting  and 
sinking  under  her  when  she  tried  to  dance.  It 
was  an  awful  scene,  breaking  so  suddenly  into 
the  easy  programme  of  the  evening,  and  one  of 
the  most  cowardly  and  unmanly  exhibitions  that 
I  have  ever  witnessed.     There  did  not  seem  to 


THE   SHOW-PLACES   OF   PARIS  87 

be  a  man  in  the  place  who  was  not  standing  up 
and  yelHng  "  A  bas  Duclerc !"  and  the  groans 
and  hisses  and  abuse  were  Hke  the  worst  efforts 
of  a  mob.  Of  course  the  stones  did  not  hurt  the 
woman,  but  the  insult  of  being  stoned  did.  They 
put  an  end  to  her  misery  at  last  by  ringing  down 
the  curtain,  and  they  said  at  the  stage  door  after- 
wards that  she  had  been  taken  home  in  a  fit. 

When  I  saw  her  a  few  months  later  at  Pastor's, 
I  was  thankful  that,  as  a  people,  our  self-respect 
is  not  so  easily  hurt  as  to  make  us  revenge  a 
slight  upon  it  by  throwing  stones  at  a  woman. 
Of  course  a  Frenchman  might  say  that  it  is  not 
fair  to  judge  the  Parisians  by  the  audience  of  a 
music-hall,  but  there  were  several  ladies  of  title 
and  gentlemen  of  both  worlds  in  the  audience, 
who  a  few  months  later  assailed  Jane  Harding 
when  she  appeared  as  Phryne  in  the  Opera  Co- 
mique  with  exactly  the  same  violence  and  for  as 
little  cause.  These  outbursts  are  only  temporary 
aberrations,  however  ;  as  one  of  the  attendants  of 
the  Ambassadeurs'  said,  "  To-morrow  they  will 
applaud  her  the  more  to  make  up  for  it,"  which 
they  probably  did.  It  is  in  the  same  spirit  that 
they  change  the  names  of  streets,  and  pull  down 
columns  only  to  rebuild  them  again,  until  it 
would  seem  a  wise  plan  for  them,  as  one  Eng- 


88  ABOUT   PARIS 

Hshman  suggested,  to  put  the  Column  of  Ven- 
dome  on  a  hinge,  so  that  it  could  be  raised  and 
lowered  with  less  trouble. 

Of  the  public  gardens  and  dance-halls  there 
are  a  great  number,  and  the  men  who  have  vis- 
ited Paris  do  not  have  to  be  told  much  concern- 
ing them,  and  the  women  obtain  a  sufficiently 
correct  idea  of  what  they  are  like  from  the  pho- 
tographs along  the  Rue  de  Rivoli  to  prevent 
their  wishing  to  learn  more.  What  these  gar- 
dens were  in  the  days  of  the  Second  Empire, 
when  the  Jardin  Mabille  and  the  Bal  Bullier  were 
celebrated  through  books  and  illustrations,  and 
by  word  of  mouth  by  every  English  and  Amer- 
ican traveller  who  had  visited  them,  it  is  now 
difficult  to  say.  It  may  be  that  they  were  the 
scenes  of  mad  abandon  and  fascinating  frenzy,  of 
which  the  last  generation  wrote  with  mock  horror 
and  with  suggestive  smiles,  and  of  which  its  mem- 
bers now  speak  with  a  sigh  of  regret.  But  we 
are  always  ready  to  doubt  whether  that  which 
has  passed  away,  and  which  in  consequence  we 
cannot  see,  was  as  remarkable  as  it  is  made  to 
appear.  We  depreciate  it  in  order  to  console 
ourselves.  And  if  the  Mabille  and  the  Bullier 
were  no  more  wickedly  attractive  in  those  days 
than  is  the  Moulin  Rouge  which  has  taken  their 


SOME    YOUNG   PEOPLE    OF   MONTMARTRE 


THE   SHOW-PLACES   OF   PARIS  91 

place  under  the  Republic,  we  cannot  but  feel 
that  the  men  of  the  last  generation  visited  Paris 
when  they  were  very  young.  Perhaps  it  is  true 
that  Paris  was  more  careless  and  happy  then. 
It  can  easily  be  argued  so,  for  there  was  more 
money  spent  under  the  Empire,  and  more  money 
given  away  in  fetes  and  in  spectacles  and  in  pub- 
lic pleasures,  and  the  Parisian  in  those  days  had 
no  responsibility.  Novv  that  he  has  a  voice  and 
a  vote,  and  is  the  equal  of  his  President,  he  de- 
votes himself  to  those  things  which  did  not  con- 
cern him  at  all  in  the  earlier  times.  Then  the 
Emperor  and  his  ministers  felt  the  responsibility, 
and  asked  of  him  only  that  he  should  enjoy 
himself. 

But  whatever  may  have  been  true  of  the  spirit 
of  Paris  then,  the  man  who  visits  it  to-day  ex- 
pecting to  see  Leech's  illustrations  and  Mark 
Twain's  description  of  the  Mabille  reproduced 
in  the  Jardin  de  Paris  and  the  Moulin  Rouge 
will  be  disappointed.  He  will,  on  the  contrary, 
find  a  great  deal  of  light  and  some  very  good 
music,  and  a  mixed  crowd  composed  chiefly  of 
young  women  and  Frenchmen  well  advanced  in 
years  and  English  and  American  tourists.  The 
young  women  have  all  the  charm  that  only 
a   Frenchwoman   possesses,  and   parade    quietly 


92  ABOUT   PARIS 

below  the  boxes,  and  before  the  rows  of  seats 
that  stretch  around  the  hall  or  the  garden,  as  it 
happens  to  be,  and  are  much  better  behaved 
and  infinitely  more  self-respecting  and  attractive 
in  appearance  than  the  women  of  their  class  in 
London  or  New  York.  But  there  are  no  stu- 
dents nor  grisettes  to  kick  off  high  hats  and  to 
dance  in  an  ecstasy  of  abandon.  There  are  in 
their  places  from  four  to  a  dozen  ugly  women 
and  shamefaced-looking  men,  who  are  hired  to 
dance,  and  who  go  sadly  through  the  figures  of 
the  quadrille,  while  one  of  the  women  after  an- 
other shows  how  high  she  can  kick,  and  from 
what  a  height  she  can  fall  on  the  asphalt,  and  do 
what  in  the  language  of  acrobats  is  called  a 
"  split ;"  there  is  no  other  name  for  it.  It  is  not 
an  edifying  nor  thrilling  spectacle. 

The  most  notorious  of  these  dance-halls  is  the 
Moulin  Rouge.  You  must  have  noticed  when 
journeying  through  France  the  great  windmills 
that  stand  against  the  sky-line  on  so  many  hill- 
tops. They  are  a  picturesque  and  typical  feat- 
ure of  the  landscape,  and  seem  to  signify  the 
honest  industry  and  primitiveness  of  the  French 
people  of  the  provinces.  And  as  the  great  arms 
turn  in  the  wind  you  can  imagine  you  can  hear 
the  sound  of  the  mill-wheel  clackinr;:  while  the 


THE   SHOW-PLACES   OF   PARIS  95 

wheels  inside  grind  out  the  flour  that  is  to  give 
Hfe  and  health.  And  so  when  you  see  the  great 
Red  Mill  turn  high  up  where  four  streets  meet 
on  the  side  of  Montmartre,  and  know  its  pur- 
pose, you  are  impressed  with  the  grim  contrast 
of  its  past  uses  and  its  present  notoriety.  An 
imaginative  person  could  not  fail  to  be  im- 
pressed by  the  sight  of  the  Moulin  Rouge  at 
night.  It  glows  like  a  furnace,  and  the  glare 
from  its  lamps  reddens  the  sky  and  lights  up  the 
surrounding  streets  and  cafes  and  the  faces  of 
the  people  passing  like  a  conflagration.  The 
mill  is  red,  the  thatched  roof  is  red,  the  arms  are 
picked  out  in  electric  lights  in  red  globes,  and 
arches  of  red  lamp-shades  rise  on  every  side 
against  the  blackness  of  the  night.  Young  men 
and  women  are  fed  into  the  blazing  doors  of  the 
mill  nightly,  and  the  great  arms,  as  they  turn  un- 
ceasingly and  noisily  in  a  fiery  circle  through  the 
air,  seem  to  tell  of  the  wheels  within  that  are 
grinding  out  the  life  and  the  health  and  souls  of 
these  young  people  of  Montmartre. 

If  you  have  visited  many  of  the  places  touched 
upon  in  this  article  in  the  same  night,  you  will 
find  yourself  caught  in  the  act  by  the  early  sun- 
light, and  as  it  will  then  be  too  late  to  go  to  bed, 
you  can  do  nothing  better  than  turn  your  steps 


96  ABOUT   PARIS 

towards  the  Madeleine.  There  you  may  find  the 
market -people  taking  the  flowers  out  of  the 
black  canvas  wagons  and  putting  up  the  tem- 
porary booths,  while  the  sidewalk  is  hidden  with 
a  mass  of  roses  in  their  white  paper  cornucopiai 
and  the  dark,  damp  green  of  palms  and  ferns. 

It  will  be  well  worth  your  while  to  go  on 
through  the  silent  streets  from  this  market  of 
flowers  to  the  market  of  food  in  the  Halles  Cen- 
trales, where  there  are  strawberry  patches  stretch- 
ing for  a  block,  and  bounded  by  acres  of  radishes 
or  acres  of  mushrooms,  and  by  queer  fruits  from 
as  far  south  as  Algiers  and  Tunis,  just  arrived 
from  Marseilles  on  the  train,  and  green  pease  and 
carrots  from  no  greater  a  distance  than  just  be- 
yond the  fortifications.  It  is  the  only  spot  in 
the  city  where  many  people  are  awake.  Every- 
body is  awake  here,  bustling  and  laughing  and 
scolding  —  porters  with  brass  badges  on  their 
sleeves  carrying  great  piles  of  vegetables,  and 
plump  market-women  in  white  sleeves  and 
caps,  and  drivers  in  blue  blouses  smacking  their 
lips  over  their  hot  coffee  after  their  long  ride 
through  the  night.  It  is  like  a  great  exposi- 
tion building  of  food  exhibits,  with  the  differ- 
ence that  all  of  these  exhibits  are  to  be  scattered 
and  are  to  disappear  on  the  breakfast-tables  of 


THE  SHOW-PLACES   OF   PARIS  97 

Paris  that  same  morning.  Loud-voiced  gentle- 
men are  auctioneering  off  whole  crops  of  pota- 
toes, a  sidewalk  at  a  time,  or  a  small  riverful  of 
fish  with  a  single  clap  of  the  hands ;  live  lobsters 
and  great  turtles  crawl  and  squirm  on  marble 
slabs,  and  vistas  of  red  meat  stretch  on  iron 
hooks  from  one  street  corner  to  the  next. 

You  are,  and  feel  that  you  are,  a  drone  in  this 
busy  place,  and  salute  with  a  sense  of  guilty 
companionship  the  groups  of  men  and  girls  in 
dinner  dress  who  have  been  up  all  night,  and 
who  come  singing  and  chaffing  in  their  open 
carriages  in  search  of  coffee  and  a  box  of  straw- 
berries, or  a  bunch  of  cold,  crisp  radishes  with 
the  dew  still  on  them,  which  they  buy  from  a 
virtuous  matron  of  grim  and  disapproving  coun- 
tenance at  a  price  which  throws  a  lurid  light 
on  the  profits  of  Bignon's  and  Laurent's. 

And  then  you  become  conscious  of  your  even- 
ing dress  and  generally  dissolute  and  out-of-place 
air,  and  hurry  home  through  the  bright  sunlight 
to  put  out  your  sputtering  candle  and  to  creep 
shamefacedly  to  bed. 


Ill 


PARIS   IN   MOURNING 


c:^^ 


HE  news  of  the  assassina- 
tion of  President  Carnot 
at  Lyons  reached  Paris 
and  the  Cafe  de  la  Paix  at 
ten  o'clock  on  Sunday  night. 
What  is  told  at  the  Cafe  de  la 
Paix  is  not  long  in  traversing 
the  length  of  the  boulevards, 
and  in  crossing  the  Place  de 
la  Concorde  to  the  cafes  chan- 
tants  and  the  public  gardens 
in  the  Champs  Elysees,  so 
that  by  eleven  o'clock  on  the 
night  of  the  24th  of  June  "  all 
Paris "  was  acquainted  with 
the  fact  that  the  President  of 
the  Republic  had  been  cruelly 
murdered. 

There  are  many  people  in 
America  who  remember  the 


PARIS   IN    MOURNING  99 

night  when  President  Garfield  died,  and  how, 
when  his  death  was  announced  from  the  stage 
of  the  different  theatres,  the  audience  in  each 
theatre  rose  silently  as  one  man  and  walked  qui- 
etly out.  To  them  the  President's  death  was  not 
unexpected ;  it  did  not  stun  them,  it  came  with 
no  sudden  shock,  but  it  was  not  necessary  to  an- 
nounce to  them  that  the  performance  for  that 
evening  was  at  an  end.  They  did  not  leave  be- 
cause the  manager  had  rung  down  the  curtain, 
but  because  at  such  a  time  they  felt  more  at  ease 
with  themselves  outside  of  a  place  of  amusement 
than  in  one. 

This  was  not  the  feeling  of  the  Parisians  when 
President  Carnot  died.  On  that  night  no  lights 
were  put  out  in  the  cafes ;  no  leader's  baton 
rapped  for  a  sudden  silence  in  the  Jardin  de 
Paris,  and  the  Parisians  continued  to  drink  their 
bock  and  to  dance,  or  to  watch  others  dance, 
even  though  they  knew  that  at  that  same  mo- 
ment Madame  Carnot  in  a  special  train  was  hur- 
rying through  the  night  to  reach  the  death-bed 
of  her  husband.  It  is  never  possible  to  tell 
which  way  the  French  people  will  jump,  or  how 
they  will  act  at  a  crisis.  They  have  no  prece- 
dents of  conduct ;  they  are  as  likely  to  do  the 
characteristic  thing,  which  in  itself  is  different 


loo  ABOUT   PARIS 

from  what  people  of  any  other  nation  would  do 
under  like  circumstances,  as  the  uncharacteristic 
thing,  which  is  even  more  unexpected.  They 
complicate  history  by  behaving  with  perfect 
tranquillity  when  other  people  would  become 
excited,  and  by  losing  their  heads  when  there  is 
no  occasion  for  it.  As  the  Yale  captain  said  of 
the  Princeton  team,  "  They  keep  you  guessing." 
So  when  I  was  convinced  by  the  morning 
papers,  after  the  first  shock  of  unbelief,  that  the 
President  of  France  was  dead,  I  walked  out  into 
the  streets  to  see  what  sign  there  would  be  of  it 
in  Paris.  I  argued  that  in  a  city  given  to  dem- 
onstrations the  feelings  of  the  people  would  take 
some  actual  and  visible  form  ;  that  there  would 
be  meetings  in  the  street,  rioting  perhaps  in  the 
Italian  quarter,  and  extraordinary  expressions  of 
grief  in  the  shape  of  crepe  and  mourning.  But 
the  people  were  as  undisturbed  and  tranquil  as 
the  sun  ;  the  same  men  were  sitting  at  the  same 
round  tables ;  the  same  women  were  shopping  in 
the  Rue  de  la  Paix,  and  but  for  an  increased 
energy  on  the  part  of  the  newsboys  there  was  no 
sign  that  a  good  man  had  died,  that  one  who 
had  harmed  no  one  had  himself  been  cruelly 
harmed,  and  that  the  highest  ofifice  of  the  state 
was  vacant. 


PARIS   IN   MOURNING  loi 

When  I  complained  of  this  to  Parisians,  or 
to  those  who  were  Parisians  by  choice  and  not 
by  birth,  they  explained  it  by  saying  that  the 
people  were  stunned.  "  They  are  too  shocked 
to  act.  It  is  a  horror  without  a  precedent,"  they 
said ;  but  it  struck  me  that  they  were  an  inor- 
dinately long  time  in  recovering  from  the  blow. 
At  one  o'clock  on  Monday  morning  a  workman 
crawled  out  upon  the  roof  of  the  Invalides,  and, 
gathering  the  tricolored  flag  in  his  arms,  tied  a 
wisp  of  crepe  about  it.  The  flags  in  the  Cham- 
ber of  Deputies  and  in  the  War  Of^ce  were  draped 
in  the  same  manner,  and  with  these  three  ex- 
ceptions I  saw  no  other  visible  sign  of  mourning 
in  all  Paris.  On  Monday  night  those  theatres 
subsidized  by  the  government,  and  some  others, 
but  not  all,  were  closed  for  that  evening.  At 
three  o'clock  on  Tuesday,  two  days  after  the 
death  of  the  President,  I  counted  but  three  flags 
draped  with  crepe  on  the  boulevards ;  but  on 
the  day  following  all  the  shops  on  the  Rue  de 
la  Paix  and  the  hotels  on  the  Rue  de  Rivoli  put 
out  flags  covered  with  mourning,  and  so  adver- 
tised themselves  and  their  grief.  It  is  interest- 
ing to  remember  that  the  most  generous  display 
of  crepe  in  Paris  was  made  by  an  English  firm  of 
ladies'  tailors.     During  this  time  the  correspond- 


ABOUT    PARIS 


ents  were  cabling  of  the  grief  and  rage  of  the 
Parisians  to  sympathetic  peoples  all  over  the 
world ;  and  we,  in  our  turn,  were  reading  in 
Paris  the  telegrams  of  condolence  and  the  reso- 
lutions of  sympathy  from  as  different  sources  as 
the  Parliament  of  Cape  Town  and  the  Congress 
of  the  United  States.  What  effect  the  reading 
of  these  sincere  and  honest  words  had  upon  the 
people  of  Paris  I  do  not  know,  but  I  could  not 
at  the  time  conceive  of  their  reading  them  with- 
out blushing.  I  looked  up  from  the  paper  which 
gave  Lord  Rosebery's  speech,  and  the  brotherly 
words  which  came  from  little  colonies  in  the 
Pacific,  from  barbarous  monarchs,  and  from  wid- 
ows to  Madame  Carnot,  and  from  corporations. 
Emperors,  and  Presidents  to  the  city  of  Paris, 
and  saw  nothing  in  the  countenances  of  the 
Parisians  at  the  table  next  to  mine  but  smiles  of 
gratification  at  the  importance  that  they  had  so 
suddenly  attained  in  the  eyes  of  the  whole  world. 
It  was  also  interesting  to  note  by  the  Paris 
papers  how  the  French  valued  the  expressions  of 
sympathy  which  poured  in  upon  them.  The  fact 
that  both  Houses  in  the  United  States  had  ad- 
journed to  do  honor  to  the  memory  of  M.  Carnot 
was  not  in  their  minds  of  as  much  importance  as 
was  the  telegram  from  the  Czar  of  Russia,  which 


AT   THE   JARDIN    DE   PARIS 


PARIS   IN   MOURNING  I05 

was  given  the  most  important  place  in  every 
paper.  It  was  followed  almost  invariably  by  the 
message  from  the  German  Emperor,  whose  tele- 
gram, it  is  also  interesting  to  remember,  was  the 
second  one  to  reach  Paris  after  the  death  of  the 
President  was  announced.  When  one  reads  a 
congratulatory  telegram  from  the  German  Em- 
peror on  the  result  of  the  Cambridge  -  Oxford 
boat-race,  and  another  of  condolence  to  the  King 
of  Greece  in  reference  to  an  earthquake,  and 
then  this  one  to  the  French  people,  it  really 
seems  as  though  the  young  ruler  did  not  mean 
that  any  event  of  importance  should  take  place 
anywhere  without  his  having  something  to  say 
concerning  it.  But  this  last  telegram  was  well 
timed,  and  the  line  which  said  that  M.  Carnot 
had  died  like  a  soldier  at  his  post  was  well 
chosen  to  please  the  French  love  of  things  mili- 
tary, and  please  them  it  did,  as  the  Emperor 
knew  that  it  would.  But  the  condolence  from 
the  sister  republic  across  the  sea  was  printed  at 
the  end  of  the  column,  after  those  from  Bulgaria 
and  Switzerland.  In  the  eyes  of  the  Parisian 
news  editor,  the  sympathy  of  the  people  of  a 
great  nation  was  not  so  important  to  his  readers 
as  the  few  words  from  an  Emperor  to  whom 
they  looked  for  help  in  time  of  war. 


Io6  ABOUT   PARIS 

This  was  not  probably  true  of  the  whole  of 
France,  but  it  was  true  of  the  Parisians.  Two 
years  from  now  Carnot's  assassination  will  have 
become  history,  and  will  impress  them  much 
more  than  it  did  at  the  time  of  his  death.  The 
next  Salon  will  be  filled  with  the  apotheosis  of 
Carnot,  with  his  portrait  and  with  pictures  of  his 
murder,  and  of  France  in  mourning  laying  a 
wreath  upon  his  tomb.  His  son  will  find  quick 
promotion  in  the  army,  and  may  possibly  aspire 
to  Presidential  honors,  or  threaten  the  safety  of 
the  republic  with  a  military  dictatorship.  It 
sounds  absurd  now,  but  it  is  quite  possible  in  a 
country  where  General  Dodds  at  once  became 
a  dangerous  Presidential  possibility  because  he 
had  conquered  the  Dahomans  in  the  swamps  of 
Africa. 

Where  the  French  will  place  Carnot  in  their 
history,  and  how  they  will  reverence  his  mem- 
ory, the  next  few  years  will  show ;  but  it  is  a 
fact  that  at  the  time  of  his  death  they  treated 
him  with  scant  consideration,  and  were  much 
more  impressed  with  the  effect  which  their  loss 
made  upon  others  than  with  what  it  meant  to 
them.  It  is  not  a  pleasant  thing  to  write  about, 
nor  is  it  the  point  of  view  that  was  taken  at  the 
time,  but  in  writing  of  facts  it  is  more  interest- 


PARIS     IN   MOURNING  lO/ 

ing  to  report  things  as  they  happened  than  as 
they  should  have  happened. 

It  is  also  true  that  those  Parisians  who  could 
decently  make  a  little  money  out  of  the  nation's 
loss  went  about  doing  so  with  an  avidity  that 
showed  a  thrifty  mind.  Almost  every  one  who 
had  windows  or  balconies  facing  the  line  of  the 
funeral  procession  offered  them  for  rent,  and  ad- 
vertised them  vigorously  by  placards  and  through 
the  papers ;  venders  of  knots  of  crepe  and  em- 
blems of  mourning  filled  the  streets  with  their 
cries.  Portraits  of  Carnot  in  heavy  black  were 
hawked  about  by  the  same  men  who  weeks  be- 
fore had  sold  ridiculous  figures  of  him  taking  off 
his  hat  and  bowing  to  an  imaginary  audience ; 
the  great  shops  removed  their  summer  costumes 
from  the  windows  and  put  stacks  of  flags  bound 
with  crepe  in  their  place ;  the  flower-shops  lined 
the  sidewalks  with  specimens  of  their  work  in 
mourning-wreaths;  and  the  papers,  after  their  first 
expression  of  grief,  proceeded  to  actively  discuss 
Carnot's  successor,quoting  the  popularity  of  differ- 
ent candidates  by  giving  the  betting  odds  for  and 
against  them,  as  they  had  done  the  week  before, 
when  the  horses  were  entered  for  the  Grand  Prix. 
This  was  three  days  after  Carnot's  death,  and 
while  he  was  still  lying  unburied  at  the  Elysee. 


Io8  ABOUT   PARIS 

The  French  constitution  provides  that  in 
such  an  event  as  that  of  1893  the  National  As- 
sembly shall  be  convened  immediately  to  select 
a  new  President.  According  to  this  the  Presi- 
dent of  the  Senate,  in  his  capacity  as  President 
of  the  National  Assembly,  decided  that  the  two 
Chambers  should  convene  for  that  purpose  at 
Versailles  on  Wednesday,  June  27th,  at  one 
o'clock.  This  certainly  seemed  to  promise  a 
scene  of  unusual  activity,  and  perhaps  historical 
importance.  I  knew  what  the  election  of  a  Pres- 
ident meant  to  us  at  home,  and  I  argued  that  if 
the  less  excitable  Americans  could  work  them- 
selves up  into  such  a  state  of  frenzy  that  they 
blocked  the  traffic  of  every  great  city,  and  red- 
dened the  sky  with  bonfires  from  Boston  to  San 
Francisco,  the  Frenchman's  ecstasy  of  excite- 
ment would  be  a  spectacle  of  momentous  inter- 
est. This  seemed  to  be  all  the  more  probable 
because  to  the  American  an  election  means  a 
new  Executive  but  for  the  next  four  years,  while 
to  the  Frenchman  the  new  state  of  affairs  that 
threatened  him  would  extend  for  seven.  Young 
Howlett  had  a  vacant  place  on  the  top  of  his 
public  coach,  and  was  just  turning  the  corner  as 
I  came  out  of  the  hotel ;  so  I  went  out  with  him, 
and  looked  anxiously  down  on  each  side  to  see 


PARIS    IN   MOURNING  III 

the  hurrying  crowds  pushing  forward  to  the  pal- 
ace in  the  suburbs ;  and  when  I  found  that  all 
roads  did  not  lead  to  Versailles  that  day,  I  de- 
cided that  it  must  be  because  we  were  on  the 
wrong  one,  which  would  eventually  lead  us  some- 
where else. 

It  did  not  seem  possible  that  the  Parisians 
would  feel  so  little  interest  as  to  who  their 
new  President  might  be  that  they  would  remain 
quietly  in  Paris  while  he  was  being  elected  on  its 
outskirts.  I  expected  to  see  them  trooping  out 
along  the  seven -mile  road  to  Versailles  in  as 
great  numbers  as  when  they  went  there  once 
before  to  bring  a  Queen  back  to  Paris.  But 
when  we  drove  into  Versailles  the  coach  rattled 
through  empty  streets.  There  were  no  proces- 
sions of  cheering  men  in  white  hats  tramping  to 
the  music  of  "  Marching  through  Georgia."  No 
red,  white,  and  blue  umbrellas,  no  sky-rocket 
yells,  no  dangling  badges  with  gold  fringe,  noth- 
ing that  makes  a  Presidential  convention  in 
Chicago  the  sight  of  a  lifetime.  No  one  was 
shouting  the  name  of  his  political  club  or  his 
political  favorite ;  no  one  had  his  handkerchief 
tucked  inside  his  collar  and  a  palm  leaf  in  his 
hand  ;  there  were  no  brass  -  bands,  no  banners, 
and  not  even   beer.     Nor  was  there  any  of  the 


112  ABOUT   PARIS 

excitement  which  surrounds  the  election  of  even 
a  Parliamentary  candidate  in  England.  I  saw 
no  long  line  of  sandwich-men  tramping  in  each 
gutter,  no  violent  Radicals  hustling  equally 
elated  Conservatives,  and  crying,  "  Good  old 
Smith  !"  or  "  Good  old  Brown  !"  no  women  with 
primrose  badges  stuck  to  their  persons  making 
speeches  or  soliciting  votes  from  the  back  of 
dog-carts.  And  nobody  was  engaged  in  throw- 
ing kippered  herring  or  blacking  the  eyes  of  any- 
body else.  Versailles  was  as  unmoved  as  the 
statues  in  her  public  squares.  Her  broad,  hos- 
pitable streets  lay  cool  and  quiet  in  the  reflec- 
tion of  her  yellow  house- fronts,  and  under  the 
heavy  shadows  of  the  double  rows  of  elms  the 
round,  flat  cobble-stones,  unsoiled  by  hurrying 
footsteps,  were  as  clean  and  regular  as  a  pan  of 
biscuit  ready  for  the  oven. 

There  were  about  six  hundred  Deputies  in  the 
town,  who  had  not  been  there  the  day  before, 
and  who  would  leave  it  before  the  sun  set  that 
evening,  but  they  bore  themselves  so  modestly 
that  their  presence  could  not  disturb  the  sleepy, 
sunny  beauty  of  the  grand  old  gardens  and  of 
the  silent  thoroughfares,  and  when  we  rattled  up 
to  the  Hotel  des  Reservoirs  at  one  o'clock  we 
made  more  of  a  disturbance  with  the  coach-horn 


PARIS   IN   MOURNING  II3 

than  had  the  arrival  of  both  Chambers  of  Depu- 
ties. These  gentlemen  were  at  dejeuner  when 
we  arrived,  and  eating  and  drinking  as  leisurely 
and  good-naturedly  as  though  they  had  nothing 
in  hand  of  more  importance  than  a  few  calls  to 
make  or  a  game  of  cards  at  the  club.  Indeed,  it 
looked  much  more  as  though  Versailles  had  been 
invaded  by  a  huge  wedding-party  than  by  a  con- 
vention of  Presidential  electors.  Some  of  the 
Deputies  had  brought  their  wives  with  them, 
and  few  as  they  were,  they  leavened  and  enliv- 
ened the  group  of  black  coats  as  the  same  num- 
ber of  women  of  no  other  nation  could  have  done, 
and  the  men  came  from  different  tables  to  speak 
to  them,  to  drink  their  health,  and  to  pay  them 
pretty  compliments ;  and  the  good  fellows  of 
the  two  Chambers  hustled  about  like  so  many 
maitres  d'hotel  seeing  that  such  a  one  had  a 
place  at  the  crowded  tables,  that  the  salad  of 
this  one  was  being  properly  dressed,  and  that 
another  had  a  match  for  his  cigarette. 

Besides  the  Deputies,  there  were  a  half-dozen 
young  and  old  Parisians — those  who  make  it  a 
point  to  see  everything  and  to  be  seen  every- 
where. They  would  have  attended  quite  as  will- 
ingly a  fete  of  flowers,  or  a  prize-fight  between 
two    English   jockeys   at    Longchamps,   and    at 


114  ABOUT   PARIS 

either  place  they  would  have  been  as  complete- 
ly at  home.  They  were  typical  Parisians  of  the 
highest  world,  to  whom  even  the  selection  of  a 
President  for  all  France  was  not  without  its  in- 
terest. With  them  were  the  diplomats,  who  were 
pretending  to  take  the  change  of  executive  seri- 
ously, as  representatives  of  the  powers,  but  who 
were  really  whispering  that  it  would  probably 
bring  back  the  leadership  of  the  fashionable 
world  to  the  Elysee,  where  it  should  be,  and 
that  it  meant  the  reappearance  of  many  royalist 
families  in  society,  and  the  inauguration  of  mag- 
nificent functions,  and  the  reopening  of  ball- 
rooms long  unused. 

It  was  throughout  a  pretty,  lazy,  well-bred 
scene.  Outside  the  entrance  to  the  hotel,  coach- 
men with  the  cockades  of  the  different  embassies 
in  their  hats  were  standing  at  ease  in  their  shirt- 
sleeves, and  with  their  pipes  between  their  teeth ; 
and  the  gentlemen,  having  finished  their  break- 
fast, strolled  out  into  the  court-yard  and  watched 
the  hostlers  rubbing  down  the  coach-horses,  or 
walked  up  the  hill  to  the  palace,  where  the  boy 
sentries  were  hugging  their  guns,  and  waving 
back  the  few  surprised  tourists  who  had  come  to 
look  at  the  pictures  in  the  historical  gallery,  and 
who  did  not  know  that  the  palace  on  that  day 


TO   BRING   A   QUEEN   BACK   TO   PARIS' 


PARIS   IN   MOURNING  1 17 

was  being  used  for  the  prologue  of  a  new  histor- 
ical play. 

At  the  gates  leading  to  the  great  Court  of 
Honor  there  were  possibly  two  hundred  people 
in  all.  They  came  from  the  neighboring  streets, 
and  not  from  Paris.  None  of  these  people  spoke 
in  tones  louder  than  those  of  ordinary  converse, 
and  they  speculated  with  indolent  interest  as  to 
the  outcome  of  the  afternoon's  voting.  A  young 
man  in  a  brown  straw  hat  found  an  objection  to 
Casimir-Perier  as  a  candidate  because  he  was  so 
rich,  but  he  withdrew  his  objection  when  an  old- 
er man  in  a  blouse  pointed  out  that  Casimir- 
Perier  would  make  an  excellent  appearance  on 
horseback. 

"  The  President  of  France,"  he  said,  "  must  be 
a  man  who  can  look  well  on  a  horse ;"  and  the 
crowd  of  old  women  in  white  caps,  and  boy  sol- 
diers with  their  hands  on  their  baggy  red  breech- 
es, from  the  barracks  across  the  square,  nodded 
their  heads  approvingly.  It  was  a  most  interest- 
ing sight  when  compared  with  the  anxious,  howl- 
ing mob  that  surrounds  the  building  in  which  a 
Presidential  convention  is  being  held  at  home. 

It  is  also  interesting  to  remember  that  a  spe- 
cial telephone  wire  was  placed  in  the  Chamber 
at  Versailles  in  order  that  the  news  of  the  elec- 


Il8  ABOUT   PARIS 

tion  might  be  communicated  to  the  newspaper 
offices  in  Paris,  and  that  this  piece  of  enter- 
prise was  considered  so  remarkable  that  it  was 
commented  upon  by  the  entire  newspaper  press 
of  that  city.  In  Chicago,  at  the  time  of  the 
last  Presidential  convention,  when  a  nomination 
merely  and  not  an  election  was  taking  place, 
the  interest  of  the  people  justified  the  West- 
ern Union  Telegraph  Company  in  sending  out 
fifteen  million  words  from  the  building  during 
the  three  days  of  the  convention.  Wires  ran 
from  it  directly  to  the  ofifices  of  all  the  principal 
newspapers  from  San  Francisco  to  Boston,  and 
in  Chicago  itself  there  were  two  hundred  extra 
operators,  and  relays  of  horsemen  galloping  con- 
tinually with  "  copy  "  from  the  convention  to  the 
main  offices  of  the  different  telegraph  companies. 
This  merely  shows  a  difference  of  tempera- 
ment :  the  American  likes  to  know  what  has 
happened  while  it  is  hot,  and  to  know  all  that 
has  happened.  The  European  and  the  Parisian, 
on  this  occasion  at  least,  was  content  to  wait  at 
a  cafe  in  ease  and  comfort  until  he  was  told  the 
result.  He  did  not  feel  that  he  could  change 
that  result  in  any  way  by  going  out  to  Versailles 
in  the  hot  sun  and  cheering  his  candidate  from 
the  outside  of  an  iron  fence. 


PARIS   IN   MOURNING  II9 

At  the  gate  of  the  Place  d'Armes  there  was  a 
crowd  of  fifty  people,  watched  by  a  few  hundred 
more  from  under  the  shade  of  the  trees  and  the 
awnings  of  the  restaurants  around  the  square. 
The  dust  rose  in  little  eddies,  and  swept  across 
the  square  in  yellow  clouds,  and  the  people 
turned  their  backs  to  it  and  shrugged  their 
shoulders  and  waited  patiently.  Inside  of  the 
Court  of  Honor  a  single  line  of  lancers  stood  at 
their  horses'  heads,  their  brass  helmets  flashing 
like  the  signals  of  a  dozen  heliographs.  Offi- 
cers with  cigarettes  and  heavily  braided  sleeves 
strolled  up  and  down,  and  took  themselves  much 
more  seriously  than  they  did  the  matter  in  hand. 
A  dozen  white-waistcoated  and  high-hatted  Dep- 
uties standing  outside  of  the  Chamber  suggest- 
ed nothing  more  momentous  or  national  than 
a  meeting  of  a  Presbyterian  General  Assembly. 
Bicyclers  of  both  sexes  swung  themselves  from 
their  machines  and  peered  curiously  through  the 
iron  fence,  and,  seeing  nothing  more  interest- 
ing than  the  fluttering  pennants  of  the  lancers, 
mounted  their  wheels  again  and  disappeared  in 
the  clouds  of  dust. 

In  the  meanwhile  Casimir- Perier  has  been 
elected  on  the  first  ballot,  which  was  taken  with- 
out incident,  save  when  one  Deputy  refused  to 


I20  ABOUT   PARIS 

announce  his  vote  as  the  roll  was  called  until  he 
was  addressed  as  "citizen,"  and  not  as  "mon- 
sieur." This  silly  person  was  finally  humored, 
and  the  result  was  declared,  and  Casimir-Perier 
left  the  hall  to  put  on  a  dress-suit  in  order  that 
he  might  receive  the  congratulations  of  his 
friends.  As  the  first  act  of  the  new  President, 
this  must  not  be  considered  as  significant  of  the 
particular  man  who  did  it,  but  as  illustrating  the 
point  of  view  of  his  countrymen,  who  do  not  see 
that  if  the  highest  office  in  the  country  cannot 
lend  sufficient  dignity  to  the  man  who  holds  it, 
a  dress-suit  or  his  appearance  on  horseback  is 
hardly  able  to  do  so.  The  congratulations  last 
a  long  time,  and  are  given  so  heartily  and  with 
such  eloquence  that  the  new  President  weeps 
while  he  grasps  the  hand  of  his  late  confreres, 
and  says  to  each,  "  You  must  help  me  ;  I  need 
you  all."  Neither  is  the  fact  that  the  President 
wept  on  this  occasion  significant  of  anything  but 
that  he  was  laboring  under  much  excitement,  and 
that  the  temperament  of  the  French  is  one  easily 
moved.  People  who  cannot  see  why  a  strong 
man  should  weep  merely  because  he  has  become 
a  President  must  remember  that  Casimir-Perier 
wears  the  cross  of  the  Legion  of  Honor  for 
bravery  in  action  on  the  field  of  battle. 


PARIS   IN   MOURNING  121 

The  congratulations  come  to  an  end  at  last, 
and  the  new  President  leaves  the  palace,  and 
takes  his  place  in  the  open  carriage  that  has 
been  waiting  his  pleasure  these  last  two  hours. 
There  is  a  great  crowd  around  the  gate  now,  all 
Versailles  having  turned  out  to  cheer  him,  and 
he  can  hear  them  crying  "Vive  le  President!" 
from  far  across  the  length  of  the  Court  of  Honor. 

M.  Dupuy,  his  late  rival  at  the  polls,  seats  him- 
self beside  him  on  his  left,  and  two  officers  in 
uniform  face  him  from  the  front.  Before  his 
carriage  are  two  open  lines  of  cavalry,  proudly 
conscious  in  their  steel  breastplates  and  with 
their  carbines  on  the  hip  that  they  are  to  convoy 
the  new  President  to  Paris;  and  behind  him,  in 
close  order,  are  the  lancers,  with  their  flashing 
brass  helmets,  and  their  pennants  fluttering  in  the 
wind\.  The  horses  start  forward  with  a  sharp 
clatter  of  hoofs  on  the  broad  stones  of  the  square, 
the  Deputies  raise  their  high  hats,  and  with  a 
jangling  of  steel  chains  and  swords,  and  with  the 
pennants  snapping  in  the  breeze  like  tiny  whips, 
the  new  President  starts  on  his  triumphal  ride 
into  Paris.  The  colossal  statues  of  France's 
great  men,  from  Charlemagne  to  Richelieu,  look 
down  upon  him  curiously  as  he  whirls  between 
them  to  the  iron  gateway  and  disappears  in  the 


122  ABOUT   PARIS 

alley  of  mounted  men  and  cheering  civilians. 
He  is  out  of  it  in  a  moment,  and  has  galloped 
on  in  a  whirling  cloud  of  yellow  dust  towards 
the  city  lying  seven  miles  away,  where,  six 
months  later,  by  his  unexpected  resignation,  he 
is  to  create  a  consternation  as  intense  as  that 
which  preceded  his  election. 

It  would  be  interesting  to  know  of  what  Casi- 
mir-Perier  thought  as  he  rode  through  the  empty 
streets  in  the  cool  of  the  summer  evening,  start- 
ling the  villagers  at  their  dinners,  and  bringing 
them  on  a  run  to  the  doors  by  the  ringing  jangle 
of  his  mounted  men  and  the  echoing  hoofs.  Per- 
haps he  thought  of  the  anarchists  who  might  at- 
tempt his  life,  or  of  those  who  succeeded  with 
the  man  whose  place  he  had  taken,  or,  what  is 
more  likely,  he  gave  himself  up  to  the  moment, 
and  said  to  himself,  as  each  new  face  was  framed 
by  a  window  or  peered  through  a  doorway :  "  Yes, 
it  is  the  new  President  of  France,  Casimir-Perier  ; 
not  only  of  France,  but  of  all  her  colonies.  By 
to-night  they  will  know  in  Siam,  in  Tunis,  in  Al- 
giers, and  in  the  swamps  of  Dahomey  that  there 
is  a  new  step  on  the  floor,  and  governors  of  prov- 
inces, and  native  rulers  of  barbarous  states,  and 
soiis-prcfcts,  and  pretenders  to  the  throne  of 
France,  will  consider  anxiously  what  the  change 


PARIS   IN    MOURNING  1 23 

means  to  them,  and  will  be  measuring  their  fort- 
unes with  mine." 

The  carriage  and  its  escort  enter  the  cool  shad- 
ows of  the  Bois  de  Boulogne  at  Passy,  and  pass 
Longchamps,  where  the  French  President  annu- 
ally reviews  the  army  of  France,  and  where  now 
the  victorias  and  broughams  and  fiacres  draw  to 
one  side  ;  and  he  notes  the  look  of  amused  inter- 
est on  the  faces  of  their  occupants  as  his  out- 
riders draw  rapidly  nearer,  and  the  smiles  of  in- 
telligence as  they  comprehend  that  it  is  the  new 
President,  and  he  catches  a  glimpse  out  of  the 
corner  of  his  eye  of  nodding  faces,  and  hats 
half  raised  in  salute  as  he  gallops  past.  It  must 
have  been  a  pleasant  drive.  Very  few'  men  have 
taken  it.  Very  few  men  have  swept  round  the 
circle  of  the  Arc  de  Triomphe  and  seen  the  mass 
of  glittering  carriages  stretching  far  down  the 
avenue  part  and  make  way  for  them  on  either 
side. 

Casimir-Perier's  brief  term  included  many  im- 
bitterments,  but  it  is  a  question  if  they  will  ever 
destroy  the  sweetness  of  that  moment  when 
power  first  touched  him  as  he  was  borne  back  to 
Paris  the  President  of  France ;  and  in  his  retire- 
ment he  will  recall  that  ride  in  the  summer  twi- 
light, which  the  refractory  Deputies  who  caused 


124  ABOUT   PARIS 

his  downfall  have  never  taken,  and  hear  again 
the  people  cheering  at  Versailles,  and  the  gallop- 
ing horses,  and  see  the  crowd  that  waited  for  him 
in  the  Place  de  la  Concorde  and  ran  beside  his 
carriage  across  the  bridge. 

Although  the  funeral  procession  was  not  to 
leave  the  Elysee  until  ten  o'clock  on  Sunday 
morning,  the  thrifty  citizens  of  Paris  began  to 
prepare  for  it  as  early  as  eleven  o'clock  on  Sat- 
urday night.  The  Champs  Elysees  at  that  hour 
was  lined  with  tables,  boxes,  and  ladders,  and 
any  other  portable  object  that  could  afford  from 
its  top  a  view  of  the  pageant  and  standing-room, 
for  which  one  might  reasonably  ask  a  franc.  This 
barricade  stretched  in  an  unbroken  front,  which 
extended  far  back  under  the  trees  from  the  Ave- 
nue Marigny  to  the  Place  de  la  Concorde,  where 
it  spread  out  over  the  raised  sidewalks  and  around 
the  fountains  and  islands  of  safety,  until  the 
square  was  transformed  into  what  looked  like  a 
great  market-place.  It  was  one  of  the  most  cu- 
rious sights  that  Parisians  have  ever  seen  in  time 
of  peace.  Over  four  thousand  people  were  en- 
camped around  these  temporary  stands,  some 
drinking  and  eating,  others  sleeping,  and  others 
busily  and  noisily  engaged  in  erecting  still  more 


PARIS   IN   MOURNING  I25 

stands,  while  the  falling  of  the  boards  that  were 
to  form  them  rattled  as  they  fell  from  the  carts 
to  the  asphalt  like  the  reports  of  musketry.  Each 
stand  was  lit  by  a  lantern  and  a  smoking  lamp  ; 
and  the  men  and  women,  as  they  moved  about 
in  the  half-darkness,  or  slept  curled  up  beneath 
the  carts  and  tables,  suggested  the  bivouac  of  an 
army,  or  that  part  of  a  besieged  city  where  the 
people  had  gathered  with  their  household  goods 
for  safety. 

The  procession  the  next  morning  moved  down 
the  Champs  Elysees  and  across  the  Place  de  la 
Concorde  and  along  the  Rue  de  Rivoli  to  Notre 
Dame,  from  whence,  after  the  ceremony  there,  it 
proceeded  on  to  the  Pantheon.  All  of  this  line  of 
march  was  guarded  on  either  side  by  double  lines 
of  infantry,  and  one  can  obtain  an  idea  of  how 
great  was  the  crowd  behind  them  by  the  fact  that 
on  the  morning  of  the  procession  five  hundred 
people  were  taken  in  ambulances  to  the  different 
hospitals  of  Paris.  This  included  those  who  had 
fainted  in  the  crush,  or  who  had  been  overcome 
by  the  heat,  or  who  had  fallen  from  one  of  the 
many  tottering  scaffoldings.  Each  of  the  great 
vases  along  the  iron  fence  of  the  Tuileries  held 
one  or  two  men,  one  of  whom  sat  opposite  us 
across  the  Rue  de  Rivoli,  who  had  been  there 


126  ABOUT   PARIS 

six  hours,  like  Stylites  on  his  pillar,  except  that 
the  Parisian  had  an  opera-glass,  a  morning  paper, 
and  a  bottle  of  red  wine  to  keep  him  company. 
The  trees  in  the  Tuileries  were  blackened  with 
men,  and  the  sky-line  of  every  house-top  moved 
with  them.  The  crowd  was  greatest  perhaps  in 
the  Place  de  la  Concorde,  where  it  spread  a  black 
carpet  over  the  great  square,  which  parted  and 
fell  away  before  the  repeated  charges  of  the 
cavalry  like  a  piece  of  cloth  before  a  pair  of 
shears.  It  was  a  most  orderly  crowd,  and  an 
extremely  good-humored  one,  and  it  manifested 
no  strong  feeling  at  any  time,  except  over  two 
features  of  the  procession,  which  had  nothing  to 
do  with  the  death  of  Carnot.  Except  when 
there  was  music,  which  was  much  too  seldom, 
the  crowd  chattered  and  laughed  as  it  might 
have  done  at  a  purely  military  function,  and 
only  the  stern  hisses  of  a  few  kept  the  majority 
from  applauding  any  one  who  passed  for  whom 
they  held  an  especial  interest. 

The  procession  left  the  Elysee  at  ten  o'clock, 
to  the  accompaniment  of  minute-guns  from  the 
battery  on  the  pier  near  the  Chamber  of  Depu- 
ties. It  was  led  by  a  very  fine  body  of  cuiras- 
siers, who  presented  a  better  appearance  than 
any  of  the  soldiers  in  the  procession.     It  was 


PARIS   IN   MOURNING  127 

not  the  great  military  display  that  had  been  ex- 
pected ;  there  was  no  artillery  in  line,  and  the 
navy  was  not  represented,  save  by  a  few  guards 
around  the  wreath  from  the  officers  of  that  par- 
ticular service.  The  regiments  of  infantry,  who 
were  followed  by  the  cavalry,  lacked  form,  and 
marched  as  though  they  had  not  convinced 
themselves  that  what  they  were  doing  was  worth 
doing  well.  The  infantry  was  followed  by  the 
mourning-wreaths  sent  by  the  Senate  and  by  the 
different  monarchs  of  Europe.  These  wreaths 
form  an  important  and  characteristic  part  of  the 
funeral  of  a  great  man  in  France,  and  as  the 
French  have  studied  this  form  of  expressing 
their  grief  for  some  time,  they  produce  the  most 
magnificent  and  beautiful  tributes,  of  greater 
proportions  and  in  better  taste  than  any  that 
can  be  seen  in  any  other  country  in  the  world. 
The  larger  of  these  wreaths  were  hung  from 
great  scaffoldings,  supported  on  floats,  each 
drawn  by  four  or  six  horses.  Some  of  these 
were  so  large  that  a  man  standing  upright  within 
them  could  not  touch  the  opposite  inner  edges 
with  his  finger-tips.  They  were  composed  en- 
tirely of  orchids  or  violets,  with  bands  of  purple 
silk  stretching  from  side  to  side,  and  bearing  the 
names  of  the  senders  in  gold  letters.    The  wreath 


128  ABOUT    PARIS 

sent  by  the  Emperor  of  Russia  was  given  a  place 
by  itself,  and  mounted  magnificently  on  a  car 
draped  with  black,  and  surrounded  by  a  special 
guard  of  military  and  servants  of  the  household. 
The  wreaths  of  the  royalties  were  followed  by 
more  soldiers,  and  then  came  the  black  and  silver 
catafalque  that  bore  the  body  of  the  late  Presi- 
dent. The  wheels  of  this  car  were  muffled  with 
cloth,  and  the  horses  that  drew  it  were  completely 
hidden  under  trappings  of  black  and  silver ;  the 
reins  were  broad  white  ribbons,  and  there  was  a 
mute  at  each  horse's  head.  As  the  car  passed, 
there  was  the  first  absolute  silence  of  the  morn- 
ing, and  many  people  crossed  themselves,  and  all 
of  the  men  stood  bareheaded. 

Separated  from  the  catafalque  by  but  a  few 
rods,  and  walking  quite  alone,  was  the  new  Presi- 
dent, Casimir-Perier.  There  were  soldiers  and  at- 
tendants between  him  and  the  line  of  soldiers 
which  guarded  the  sidewalks,  but  he  was  alone  in 
that  there  was  no  one  near  him.  According  to 
the  protocol  he  should  not  have  been  there  at  all, 
as  the  etiquette  of  this  function  ruled  that  the 
new  President  should  not  intrude  his  person  upon 
the  occasion  when  the  position  held  by  his  prede- 
cessor is  being  officially  recognized  for  the  last 
time.     Casimir-Perier,  however,  chose  to  disre- 


PARIS   IN    MOURNING  1 29 

gard  the  etiquette  of  this  protocol,  arguing  that 
the  occasion  was  exceptional,  and  that  no  one 
had  a  better  right  to  mourn  for  the  late  Presi- 
dent than  the  man  who  had  succeeded  to  the 
dangers  and  responsibilities  of  that  office.  He 
was  also  undoubtedly  moved  by  the  fact  that  it 
was  generally  believed  that  his  life  would  be  at- 
tempted if  he  did  walk  conspicuously  in  the  pro- 
cession. Had  Carnot  died  a  natural  death,  Casi- 
mir-Perier's  presence  at  the  funeral  would  have 
been  in  debatable  taste,  but  Carnot's  assassina- 
tion, and  the  threats  which  hung  thick  in  the  air, 
made  the  President  take  the  risk  he  did,  in  spite 
of  the  fact  that  Carnot  had  been  murdered  in  a 
public  place,  and  not  on  account  of  it. 

It  was  distinctly  a  courageous  thing  for  him  to 
do,  and  it  was  done  against  the  wishes  of  his 
best  friends  and  the  entreaties  of  his  family,  who 
spent  the  entire  night  before  the  procession  in  a 
chapel  praying  for  his  safety.  He  walked  erect, 
with  his  eyes  turned  down,  and  with  his  hat  at 
his  side.  He  was  in  evening  dress,  with  the  crim- 
son sash  of  the  Legion  of  Honor  across  his  breast, 
and  he  presented  a  fine  and  soldierly  bearing, 
and  made  an  impression,  both  by  his  appearance 
and  by  his  action,  that  could  not  have  been 
gained  so  soon  in  any  other  manner. 
9 


130  ABOUT  PARIS 

The  embassies  and  legations  followed  Casimir- 
Perier  in  an  irregular  mass  of  glittering  groups. 
AH  of  these  men  were  on  foot.  There  was  no 
exception  permitted  to  this  rule  ;  and  it  was  in- 
teresting to  see  Lord  Dufferin  in  the  uniform  of 
a  viceroy  of  India,  which  he  wore  instead  of  his 
diplomatic  uniform,  marching  in  the  dust  in  the 
same  line  with  the  firemen  and  letter-carriers. 
The  ambassadors  and  their  attaches  were  un- 
doubtedly the  most  brilliant  and  picturesque 
features  of  the  occasion,  and  the  United  States 
ambassador  and  his  secretaries  were,  on  account 
of  the  contrast  their  black-and-white  evening 
dress  made  to  the  colors  and  ribbons  of  the  oth- 
ers, on  this  occasion,  the  most  conspicuous  and 
appropriately  dressed  men  present. 

But  what  best  pleased  the  French  people  were 
two  girls  dressed  in  the  native  costumes  of  Al- 
sace and  Lorraine.  They  headed  the  deputation 
from  those  provinces.  The  girl  who  represented 
Alsace  was  particularly  beautiful,  with  long  black 
hair  parted  in  the  middle,  and  hanging  down  her 
back  in  long  plaits.  She  wore  the  characteristic 
head-dress  of  the  Alsacian  women,  and  a  short 
red  skirt,  black  velvet  bodice,  and  black  stock- 
ings. She  carried  the  French  flag  in  front  of  her 
draped  in  crepe,  and  as  she  stepped  briskly  for- 


THE   GIRL   WHO   REPRESENTED   ALSACE 


PARIS   IN   MOURNING  I33 

ward  the  wind  blew  the  black  bow  on  her  hair 
and  the  folds  of  the  flag  about  her  face,  and  gave 
her  a  living  and  spirited  air  that  in  no  way  suit- 
ed the  occasion,  but  which  delighted  the  popu- 
lace. They  applauded  her  and  her  companion 
from  one  end  of  the  march  to  the  other,  and 
the  spectacle  must  have  rendered  the  German 
ambassador  somewhat  uncomfortable,  and  made 
him  wish  for  a  billet  among  a  people  who  could 
learn  to  forget.  The  only  other  feature  of  the 
procession  which  called  forth  applause,  which  no 
one  tried  to  suppress,  was  the  presence  in  it  of 
an  old  general  who  was  mistaken  by  the  specta- 
tors for  Marshal  Canrobert.  This  last  of  the 
marshals  of  France  was  too  ill  to  march  in  the 
funeral  cortege ;  but  the  old  soldier,  who  looked 
not  unlike  him,  and  whose  limping  gait  and  bent 
back  and  crutch-stick  led  him  to  be  mistaken 
for  the  marshal,  served  the  purpose  quite  as 
well.  One  wondered  if  it  did  not  embarrass  the 
veteran  to  find  himself  so  suddenly  elevated  into 
the  role  of  popular  idol  of  the  hour;  but  perhaps 
he  persuaded  himself  that  it  was  his  white  hair 
and  crutch  and  many  war-medals  which  called 
forth  the  ovation,  and  that  he  deserved  it  on  his 
own  account — as  who  can  say  he  did  not  ? 

The  unpleasant  incident  of  the  day  was  one 


134  ABOUT   PARIS 

which  was  unfortunately  acted  in  full  view  of 
the  balconies  of  the  hotels  Meurice  and  Conti- 
nental. These  were  occupied  by  most  of  the 
foreigners  visiting  Paris,  and  were  virtually  the 
grandstands  of  the  spectacle. 

In  the  Rue  Castiglione,  which  separated  the 
two  hotels,  and  in  full  sight  of  these  critical  on- 
lookers, a  horse  was  taken  with  the  blind  stag- 
gers, and  upset  a  stand,  throwing  those  who  sat 
upon  it  out  into  the  street.  In  an  instant  the 
crash  of  the  falling  timbers  and  the  cries  of  the 
half-dozen  men  and  women  who  had  been  pre- 
cipitated into  the  street  struck  panic  into  the 
crowd  of  sight-seers  on  the  pavement  and  among 
the  firemen  who  were  at  that  moment  marching 
past.  The  terror  of  another  dynamite  outrage 
was  in  the  minds  of  all,  and  without  waiting 
to  learn  what  had  happened,  or  to  even  look, 
the  thousands  of  people  broke  into  a  confused 
mass  of  screaming,  terrified  creatures,  running 
madly  in  every  direction,  and  changing  the  quiet 
solemnity  of  the  moment  into  a  scene  of  horror 
and  panic.  The  firemen  dropped  the  wreath 
they  were  carrying  and  fled  with  the  crowd  ;  and 
then  the  French  soldiers  who  were  lining  the 
pavements,  to  the  astonishment  and  disgust  of 
the  Americans  and  English  on  the  balconies,  who 


PARIS   IN   MOURNING  I35 

were  looking  down  like  spectators  at  a  play, 
tucked  their  guns  under  their  arms  and  joined  in 
the  mad  rush  for  safety.  It  was  a  sight  that 
made  even  the  women  on  the  balconies  keep  si- 
lence in  shame  for  them.  It  was  pathetic,  ridic- 
ulous, and  inexcusable,  and  the  boy  officers  on 
duty  would  have  gained  the  sympathy  of  the  un- 
willing spectators  had  they  cut  their  men  down 
with  their  swords,  and  shown  the  others  that  he 
who  runs  away  from  a  falling  grandstand  is  not 
needed  to  live  to  fight  a  German  army  later.  It 
is  true  that  the  men  who  ran  away  were  only 
boys  fresh  from  the  provinces,  with  dull  minds 
filled  with  the  fear  of  what  an  anarchist  might 
do  ;  but  it  showed  a  lack  of  discipline  that  should 
have  made  the  directors  of  the  Salon  turn  the 
military  pictures  in  that  gallery  to  the  wall,  until 
the  picture  exhibited  in  the  Rue  Castiglione  was 
effaced  from  the  minds  of  the  visiting  strangers. 
Imagine  a  squad  of  New  York  policemen  run- 
ning away  from  a  horse  with  the  blind  staggers, 
and  not,  on  the  contrary,  seizing  the  chance  to 
club  every  one  within  reach  back  to  the  side- 
walk !  Remember  the  London  bobby  who  car- 
ried a  dynamite  bomb  in  his  hand  from  the  hall 
of  the  Houses  of  Parliament,  and  the  Chicago 
police  who  walked  into  a  real  anarchist  mob  over 


136  ABOUT   PARIS 

the  bodies  of  their  comrades,  and  who  answered 
the  terrifying  bombs  with  the  popping  of  their 
revolvers !  It  is  surprising  that  Napoleon,  look- 
ing down  upon  the  scene  in  the  Rue  Castiglione 
from  the  top  of  his  column,  did  not  turn  on  his 
pedestal. 

After  such  an  exhibition  as  this  it  was  only 
natural  that  the  people  should  turn  from  the 
soldiers  to  find  the  greater  interest  in  the  miles 
of  wreaths  that  came  from  every  corner  of  France. 
These  were  the  expressions  of  the  truer  sympathy 
with  the  dead  President,  and  there  seemed  to  be 
more  sentiment  and  real  regret  in  the  little  black 
bead  wreaths  from  the  villages  in  the  south  and 
west  of  France  than  there  were  in  all  the  great 
wreaths  of  orchids  and  violets  purchased  on  the 
boulevards. 

The  procession  had  been  two  hours  in  passing 
a  given  point.  It  had  moved  at  ten  o'clock,  and 
it  was  four  in  the  afternoon  before  it  dispersed 
at  the  Pantheon,  and  Deputies  in  evening  dress 
and  attaches  in  uniform  and  judges  in  scarlet 
robes  could  be  seen  hurrying  over  Paris  in  fiacres, 
faint  and  hot  and  cross,  for  the  first  taste  of  food 
and  drink  that  had  touched  their  lips  since  early 
morning.  A  few  hours  later  there  was  not  a  sol- 
dier out  of  his  barracks,  the  scaffoldings  had  been 


PARIS   IN   MOURNING  I37 

taken  to  pieces,  the  spectators  had  been  distrib- 
uted in  trains  to  the  environs,  the  bands  played 
again  in  the  gardens,  and  the  theatres  opened 
their  doors.  Paris  had  taken  off  her  mourning, 
and  fallen  back  into  her  interrupted  routine  of 
pleasure,  and  had  left  nothing  in  the  streets  to 
show  that  Carnot's  body  had  passed  over  them 
save  thousands  of  scraps  of  greasy  newspapers 
in  which  the  sympathetic  spectators  of  the  sol- 
emn function  had  wrapped  their  breakfasts. 


IV 

THE   GRAND    PRIX   AND    OTHER   PRIZES 

THINK  the  most  satisfying  thing 
about  the  race  for  the  Grand  Prix 
at  Longchamps  is  the  knowledge 
that  every  one  in  Paris  is  justifying 
your  interest  in  the  event  by  being  just  as  much 
excited  about  it  as  you  are.  You  have  the  satis- 
faction of  feehng  that  you  are  with  the  crowd, 
or  that  the  crowd  is  with  you,  as  you  choose  to 
put  it,  and  that  you  move  in  sympathy  with  hun- 
dreds of  thousands  of  people,  who,  though  they 
may  not  be  at  the  race-track  in  person,  wish  they 
were,  which  is  the  next  best  thing,  and  which 
helps  you  in  the  form  of  moral  support,  at  least. 
You  feel  that  every  one  who  passes  by  knows 
and  approves  of  your  idea  of  a  holiday,  and  will 
quite  understand  when  you  ride  out  on  the 
Champs  Elysees  at  eleven  o'clock  in  the  morn- 
ing with  four  other  men  packed  in  one  fiacre,  or 
when,  for  no  apparent  reason,  you  hurl  your  hat 
into  the  air. 


THE   GRAND   PRIX   AND   OTHER   PRIZES  139 

There  are  two  ways  of  reaching  Longchamps, 
the  right  way  and  the  wrong  way.  The  wrong 
way  is  to  go  with  the  crowd  the  entire  distance 
through  the  Bois,  and  so  find  yourself  stopped 
half  a  mile  from  the  race-track  in  a  barricade  of 
carriages  and  hired  fiacres,  with  the  wheels  scrap- 
ing, and  the  noses  of  the  horses  rubbing  the 
backs  of  the  carriages  in  front.  This  is  enter- 
taining for  a  quarter  of  an  hour,  as  you  will  find 
that  every  American  or  English  man  and  woman 
you  have  ever  met  is  sitting  within  talking  dis- 
tance of  you,  and  as  you  weave  your  way  in 
and  out  like  a  shuttle  in  a  great  loom  you  have 
a  chance  to  bow  to  a  great  many  friends,  and  to 
gaze  for  several  minutes  at  a  time  at  all  of  the 
celebrities  of  Paris.  But  after  an  hour  has  passed, 
and  you  have  discovered  that  your  driver  is  not 
as  clever  as  the  others  in  stealing  ground  and 
pushing  himself  before  his  betters,  you  begin  to 
grow  hot,  dusty,  and  cross,  and  when  you  do 
arrive  at  the  track  you  are  not  in  a  proper  frame 
of  mind  to  lose  money  cheerfully  and  politely, 
like  the  true  sportsman  that  you  ought  to  be. 

The  right  way  to  go  is  through  the  Bois  by 
the  Lakes,  stopping  within  sound  of  the  water- 
fall at  the  Cafe  de  la  Cascade.  The  advantage 
of  this  is  that  you  escape  the  crowd,  and  that  you 


I40  ABOUT   PARIS 

have  the  pleasing  certainty  in  your  mind  through- 
out the  rest  of  the  afternoon  of  knowing  that 
you  will  be  able  to  find  3/our  carriage  again  when 
the  races  are  over.  If  you  leave  your  fiacre  at 
the  main  entrance,  you  will  have  to  pick  it  out 
from  three  or  four  thousand  others,  all  of  which 
look  exactly  alike ;  and  even  if  you  do  tie  a  red 
handkerchief  around  the  driver's  whip,  you  will 
find  that  six  hundred  other  people  have  thought 
of  doing  the  same  thing,  and  you  will  be  an  hour 
in  finding  the  right  one,  and  you  will  be  jostled 
at  the  same  time  by  the  boys  in  blouses  who  are 
hunting  up  lost  carriages,  and  finding  the  owners 
to  fit  them. 

You  can  avoid  all  this  if  you  go  to  the  Cascade 
and  take  your  coachman's  little  ticket,  and  send 
him  back  to  wait  for  you  in  the  stables  of  the 
cafe,  not  forgetting  to  give  him  something  in  ad- 
vance for  his  breakfast.  It  is  then  only  a  three 
minutes'  walk  from  the  restaurant  among  the 
trees  to  the  back  door  of  the  race-track,  and  in 
five  minutes  after  you  have  left  your  carriage 
you  will  have  passed  the  sentry  at  the  ticket- 
box,  received  your  ticket  from  the  young  woman 
inside  of  it,  given  it  to  the  official  with  a  high 
hat  and  a  big  badge,  and  will  be  within  the  en- 
closure, with  your  temper   unruffled   and  your 


THE    GRAND    PRIX    AND    OTHER    PRIZES  141 

boots  immaculate.  And  then,  when  the  races 
are  over,  you  have  only  to  return  to  the  restau- 
rant and  hand  your  coachman's  ticket  to  the  tall 
chasseur,  and  let  him  do  the  rest,  while  you  wait 
at  a  little  round  table  and  order  cooling  drinks. 

All  great  race  meetings  look  very  much  alike. 
There  are  always  the  long  grandstand  with  hu- 
man beings  showing  from  the  lowest  steps  to 
the  sky-line ;  the  green  track,  and  the  miles  of 
carriages  and  coaches  encamped  on  the  other 
side  ;  the  crowd  of  well-dressed  people  in  the 
enclosure,  and  the  thin-legged  horses  cloaked 
mysteriously  in  blankets  and  stalking  around  the 
paddock  ;  the  massive  crush  around  the  betting- 
booths,  that  sweeps  slowly  in  eddies  and  cur- 
rents like  a  great  body  of  water ;  and  the  rush 
which  answers  the  starting-bell.  The  two  most 
distinctive  features  of  the  Grand  Prix  are  the 
numbers  of  beautifully  dressed  women  who  mix 
quietly  with  the  men  around  the  booths  at  which 
the  mutuals  are  sold,  and  the  fact  that  every  one 
speaks  English,  either  because  that  is  his  native 
tongue,  or  because,  if  he  be  a  Frenchman,  he 
finds  so  many  English  terms  in  his  racing  vocabu- 
lary that  it  is  easier  for  him  to  talk  entirely  in 
that  tongue  than  to  change  from  French  to  Eng- 
lish three  or  four  times  in  each  sentence. 


142  ABOUT   PARIS 

But  the  most  curious,  and  in  a  way  the  most 
interesting  feature  of  the  Grand  Prix  day,  is  the 
queer  accompaniment  to  which  the  races  are  run. 
It  never  ceases  or  slackens,  or  lowers  its  sharp 
monotone.  It  comes  from  the  machines  which 
stamp  the  tickets  bought  in  the  mutual  pools. 
If  you  can  imagine  a  hundred  ticket-collectors 
on  an  elevated  railroad  station  all  chopping  tick- 
ets at  the  same  time,  and  continuing  at  this  un- 
interruptedly for  five  hours,  you  can  obtain  an 
idea  of  the  sound  of  this  accompaniment.  It  is 
not  a  question  of  cancelling  a  five-cent  railroad 
ticket  with  these  little  instruments.  It  is  the 
same  to  them  whether  they  clip  for  the  girl  who 
wagers  a  louis  on  the  favorite  for  a  place,  and 
who  stands  to  win  two  francs,  or  for  the  English 
plunger  who  has  shoved  twenty  thousand  francs 
under  the  wire,  and  who  has  only  the  little 
yellow  and  red  ticket  which  one  of  the  machines 
has  so  nonchalantly  punched  to  show  for  his 
money.  People  may  neglect  the  horses  for 
luncheon,  or  press  over  the  rail  to  see  them 
rush  past,  or  gather  to  watch  the  President  of 
the  Republic  enter  to  a  solemn  fanfare  of  trum- 
pets between  lines  of  soldiers,  but  there  are 
always  a  few  left  to  feed  these  little  machines, 
and  their  clicking  goes  on  through  the  whole  of 


,x   '4^<^'^^ 


THE   RESTAURANT   AMONG  THE  TREES 


THE   GRAND    PRIX    AND    OTHER   PRIZES  145 

the  hot,  dusty  clay,  like  the  clipping  of  the  shears 
of  Atropos. 

The  Grand  Prix  is  the  only  race  at  which  you 
are  generally  sure  to  win  money.  You  can  do 
this  by  simply  betting  against  the  English  horse. 
The  English  horse  is  generally  the  favorite,  and 
of  late  years  the  French  horse-owners  have  been 
so  loath  to  see  the  blue  ribbon  of  the  French  turf 
go  to  perfidious  Albion  that  their  patriotism 
sometimes  overpowers  their  love  of  fair  play. 
If  the  English  horse  is  not  only  the  favorite,  but 
also  happens  to  belong  to  the  stable  of  Baron 
Hirsch,  you  have  a  combination  that  apparent- 
ly can  never  win  on  French  soil,  and  you  can 
make  your  bets  accordingly.  When  Matchbox 
walked  on  to  the  track  last  year,  he  was  escorted 
by  eight  gendarmes,  seven  detectives  in  plain 
clothes,  his  two  trainers,  and  the  jockey,  and  it 
was  not  until  he  was  well  out  in  the  middle  of 
the  track  that  this  body-guard  deserted  him. 
Possibly  if  they  had  been  allowed  to  follow  him 
round  the  course  on  bicycles  he  might  have  won, 
and  no  combination  of  French  jockeys  could  have 
ridden  him  into  the  rail,  or  held  Cannon  back 
by  a  pressure  of  one  knee  in  front  of  another, 
or  driven  him  to  making  such  excursions  into 
unknown   territory   to   avoid    these   very  things 


146  ABOUT   PARIS 

that  the  horse  had  little  strength  left  for  the 
finish. 

But  perhaps  the  French  horse  was  the  better 
one,  after  all,  and  it  was  certainly  worth  the  loss 
of  a  few  francs  to  see  the  Frenchmen  rejoice 
over  their  victory.  To  their  minds,  such  a  defeat 
of  the  English  on  the  field  of  Longchamps  went 
far  to  wipe  away  the  memory  of  that  other 
victory  on  the  field  near  Brussels. 

Grand  Prix  night  is  a  fete-night  in  Paris — that 
is,  in  the  Paris  of  the  Boulevards  and  the  Champs 
Elysees — and  if  you  wish  to  dine  well  before  ten 
o'clock,  you  should  engage  your  table  for  that 
night  several  days  in  advance. 

You  have  seen  people  during  Horse  Show  week 
in  New  York  waiting  in  the  hall  at  Delmonico's 
for  a  table  for  a  half-hour  at  a  time,  but  on  Grand 
Prix  night  you  will  see  hundreds  of  hungry  men 
standing  outside  of  the  open-air  restaurants  in 
the  Champs  Elysees,  or  wandering  disconsolately 
under  the  trees  from  the  crowded  tables  of  I'Hor- 
loge  across  the  Avenue  to  those  of  the  Ambassa- 
deurs',  and  from  them  to  the  Alcazar  d'Ete,  and 
so  on  to  Laurent's  and  the  Cafe  d'Orient.  Every 
one  apparently  is  dining  out-of-doors  on  that 
night,  and  the  white  tables,  with  their  little  lamps, 
and  with  bottles  of  red  wine  flickering-  in  their 


THE   GRAND   PRIX   AND   OTHER   PRIZES  I47 

light,  stretch  under  the  trees  from  the  Place  de 
la  Concorde  up  to  the  Avenue  Matignon.  There 
are  splashing  fountains  between  them  and  bands 
of  music,  and  the  voices  of  the  singers  in  the 
cafes  chantants  sound  shrilly  above  the  chorus  of 
rattling  china  and  of  hundreds  of  people  talking 
and  laughing,  and  the  never-ceasing  undertone  of 
the  cabs  rolling  by  on  the  great  Avenue,  with 
their  lamps  approaching  and  disappearing  in  the 
night  like  thousands  of  giant  fire-flies.  You  are 
sure  to  dine  well  in  such  surroundings,  and  espe- 
cially so  after  the  great  race — for  the  reason  that 
if  your  friends  have  won,  they  command  a  good 
dinner  to  celebrate  the  fact ;  or  should  they  have 
lost,  they  design  a  better  one  in  order  to  help 
them  forget  their  ill-fortune. 

The  spirit  of  adventure  and  excitement  that 
has  been  growing  and  feeding  upon  itself  through- 
out the  day  of  the  Grand  Prix  reaches  its  climax 
after  the  dinner  hour,  and  finds  an  outlet  among 
the  trees  and  Chinese  lanterns  of  the  Jardin  de 
Paris.  There  you  will  see  all  Paris.  It  is  the 
crest  of  the  highest  wave  of  pleasure  that  rears 
itself  and  breaks  there. 

You  will  see  on  that  night,  and  only  on  that 
night,  all  of  the  most  celebrated  women  of  Paris 
racing  with  linked  arms  about  the  asphalt  pave- 


148  ABOUT    PARIS 

ment  which  circles  around  the  band-stand.  It 
is  for  them  their  one  night  of  freedom  in  pub- 
lic, when  they  are  permitted  to  conduct  them- 
selves as  do  their  less  prosperous  sisters,  when, 
instead  of  reclining  in  a  victoria  in  the  Bois,  with 
eyes  demurely  fixed  ahead  of  them,  they  can 
throw  off  restraint  and  mix  with  all  the  men  of 
Paris,  and  show  their  diamonds,  and  romp  and 
dance  and  chaff  and  laugh  as  they  did  when  they 
were  not  so  famous.  The  French  swells  who 
are  their  escorts  have  cut  down  Chinese  lanterns 
with  their  sticks,  and  stuck  the  candles  inside 
of  them  on  the  top  of  their  high  hats  with  the 
burning  tallow,  and  made  living  torches  of 
themselves.  So  on  they  go,  racing  by — first  a 
youth  in  evening  dress,  dripping  with  candle- 
grease,  and  then  a  beautiful  girl  in  a  dinner 
gown,  with  her  silk  and  velvet  opera  cloak 
slipping  from  her  shoulders — all  singing  to  the 
music  of  the  band,  sweeping  the  people  before 
them,  or  closing  in  a  circle  around  some  stately 
dignitary,  and  waltzing  furiously  past  him  to 
prevent  his  escape.  Sometimes  one  party  will 
storm  the  band-stand  and  seize  the  musicians' 
instruments,  while  another  invades  the  stage  of 
the  little  theatre,  or  overpowers  the  women  in 
charge   of  the   shooting-galler}^,  or    institutes    a 


INTERESTED    IN    THE   WINNER 


THE   GRAND    PRIX   AND   OTHER   PRIZES  15! 

hurdle-race  over  the  iron  tables  and  the  wicker 
chairs. 

Or  you  will  see  ambassadors  and  men  of  title 
from  the  Jockey  Club  jostling  cockney  book- 
makers and  English  lords  to  look  at  a  little  girl 
in  a  linen  blouse  and  a  flat  straw  hat,  who  is 
dancing  in  the  same  circle  of  shining  shirt-fronts 
vis-a-vis  to  the  most-talked-of  young  person  in 
Paris,  who  wears  diamonds  in  ropes,  and  who 
rode  herself  into  notoriety  by  winning  a  steeple- 
chase against  a  field  of  French  officers.  The  first 
is  a  hired  dancer,  who  will  kick  off  some  gentle- 
man's hat  when  she  wants  it,  and  pass  it  round 
for  money,  and  the  other  is  the  companion  of 
princes,  and  has  probably  never  been  permitted 
to  enter  the  Jardin  de  Paris  before  ;  but  they  are 
both  of  the  same  class,  and  when  the  music  stops 
for  a  moment  they  approach  each  other  smiling, 
each  on  her  guard  against  possible  condescension 
or  familiarity ;  and  the  hired  dancer,  who  is  as 
famous  in  her  way  as  the  young  girl  with  the 
ropes  of  diamonds  is  in  hers,  compliments  ma- 
dame  on  her  dancing,  and  madame  calls  the  other 
"  mademoiselle,"  and  says,  "  How  very  warm  it 
is!"  and  the  circle  of  men  around  them,  who  are 
leaning  on  each  other's  shoulders  and  standing 
on  benches  and  tables  to  look,  smile  delightedly 


152  ABOUT   PARIS 

at  the  spectacle.  They  consider  it  very  cJiic,  this 
combination.  It  is  like  a  meeting  between  Ma- 
dame Bernhardt  and  Yvette  Guilbert. 

But  the  climax  of  the  night  was  reached  last 
year  when  the  band  of  a  hundred  pieces  struck 
buoyantly  into  that  most  reckless  and  impudent 
of  marches  and  comic  songs,  "  The  Man  that 
Broke  the  Bank  at  Monte  Carlo."  The  cymbals 
clashed,  and  the  big  drums  emphasized  the  high 
notes,  and  the  brass  blared  out  boastfully  with  a 
confidence  and  swagger  that  showed  how  sure  the 
musicians  were  of  pleasing  that  particular  au- 
dience with  that  particular  tune.  And  they  were 
not  disappointed.  The  three  thousand  men  and 
women  hailed  the  first  bars  of  the  song  with  a 
yell  of  recognition,  and  then  dancing  and  strut- 
ting to  the  rhythm  of  the  tune,  and  singing  and 
shouting  it  in  French  and  English,  they  raised 
their  voices  in  such  a  chorus  that  they  could  be 
heard  defiantly  proclaiming  who  they  were  and 
what  they  had  done  as  far  as  the  boulevards.  And 
when  they  reached  the  high  note  in  the  chorus, 
the  musicians,  carried  away  by  the  fever  of  the 
crowd,  jumped  upon  the  chairs,  and  held  their  in- 
struments as  high  above  their  heads  as  they  could 
without  losing  control  of  that  note,  and  every 
one  stood  on  tiptoe,  and  many  on  one  foot,  all 


THE   GRAND    PRIX   AND   OTHER   PRIZES  1 53 

holding  on  to  that  highest  note  as  long  as  their 
breath  lasted.  It  was  a  triumphant,  reckless  yell 
of  defiance  and  delight ;  it  was  the  war-cry  of  that 
class  of  Parisians  of  which  one  always  reads  and 
which  one  sees  so  seldom,  which  comes  to  the 
surface  only  at  unusual  intervals,  and  which,  when 
it  does  appear,  lives  up  to  its  reputation,  and  does 
not  disappoint  you. 

It  happened  a  short  time  ago,  when  I  was  in 
Paris,  that  the  ranks  of  those  members  of  the 
Institute  of  France  who  are  known  as  the  Forty 
Immortals  were  incomplete,  one  of  the  Forty 
having  but  lately  died.  I  do  "not  now  recall  the 
name  of  this  Immortal,  which  is  not,  I  trust,  an 
evidence  of  ignorance  on  my  part  so  much  as  it 
is  an  illustration  of  the  circumstance  that  when 
men  choose  to  make  sure  of  immortality  while 
they  are  alive,  in  preference  to  waiting  for  it  after 
death,  they  are  apt  to  be  considered,  when  they 
cease  to  live,  as  having  had  their  share,  and  the 
world  closes  its  account  with  them,  and  opens  up 
one  with  some  less  impatient  individual.  It  is 
only  a  matter  of  choice,  and  suggests  that  one 
cannot  have  one's  cake  and  eat  it  too.  And  so, 
while  we  can  but  envy  Francois  Coppee  in  his 
green  coat  and  his  laurel  wreath  of  the  Immor- 


154  ABOUT   PARIS 

tals  of  France,  we  may  remember  the  other  sort 
of  immortahty  that  came  to  Francois  Villon  and 
Frangois  Millet,  who  were  not  members  of  the 
Institute,  and  whose  coats  were  very  ragged  in- 
deed. I  do,  however,  remember  the  name  of  the 
gentleman  who  was  elected  to  fill  the  vacancy  in 
the  ranks  of  the  Forty,  and  in  telling  how  he  and 
other  living  men  take  on  the  robe  of  immortality 
I  hope  to  report  the  proceedings  of  one  of  the 
most  interesting  functions  of  the  French  capital. 
He  was  the  Vicomte  de  Bornier,  and  his  name 
was  especially  impressed  upon  me  by  a  para- 
graph which  appeared  in  the  Figaro  on  the  day 
following  his  admittance  to  the  Academy. 

"  M.  Manel,"  the  paragraph  read,  "  the  well- 
known  journalist,  has  renounced  his  candidacy 
for  the  vacant  chair  among  the  Forty  Immortals. 
M.  Manel  will  be  well  remerribered  by  Parisians 
as  the  author  who  has  written  so  much  and  so 
charmingly  under  the  noin  dc  phinic  of  '  Le  Vi- 
comte de  Bornier.'  "  Whether  this  was  or  was 
not  fair  to  the  gentleman  I  had  seen  so  highly 
honored  I  do  not  know,  but  it  was  calculated  to 
make  him  a  literary  light  of  interest. 

You  are  told  in  Paris  that  the  title  of  Acade- 
mician is  the  only  one  remaining  under  the  re- 
public which  counts  for  anything  ;  and,  on  the 


THE  GRAND   PRIX  AND  OTHER  PRIZES  1 55 

other  hand,  you  hear  the  Academy  called  a  pleas- 
ant club  for  old  gentlemen,  to  which  new  mem- 
bers are  elected  not  for  any  great  work  which 
they  are  doing  in  the  world,  but  because  their 
point  of  view  is  congenial  to  those  who  are  al- 
ready members.  All  that  can  be  said  against 
the  Academy  by  a  Frenchman  has  been  printed 
by  Alphonse  Daudet  in  Tlie  luimortah.  In  that 
novel  he  charges  that  the  Academy  numbs 
the  style  of  whosoever  wears  its  green  livery  ; 
he  says  that  he  who  enters  its  door  leaves  orig- 
inality behind,  that  he  grows  conservative  and 
self-conscious,  and  that  whatever  freshness  of 
thought  or  literary  method  may  have  been  his 
before  his  admittance  to  its  venerable  portals  is 
chilled  by  the  severe  classicism  of  his  thirty-nine 
brethren. 

This  may  or  may  not  be  true  of  some  of  the 
members,  but  it  certainly  cannot  be  true  of  all, 
as  many  of  them  were  never  distinguished  as 
authors,  but  were  elected,  as  were  De  Lesseps 
and  Pasteur,  for  discoveries  and  research  in  sci- 
ence, medicine,  or  engineering. 

Nor  is  it  true  of  M.  Paul  Bourget,  who  is  the 
last  distinguished  Frenchman  to  be  received  into 
the  ranks  of  the  Immortals.  The  same  observa- 
tions which  he  made  to  me  while  in  this  coun- 


156  ABOUT   PARIS 

try,  and  when  he  was  not  an  Academician,  upon 
Americans  and  American  institutions,  he  has  re- 
peated, since  his  accession  to  the  rank  of  an  Im- 
mortal, in  Outre  Mcr.  And  the  freedom  with 
which  he  has  spoken  shows  that  the  shadow  of 
the  pahn-trees  has  not  clouded  his  cosmopolitan 
point  of  view,  nor  the  classicism  of  the  Acad- 
emy dulled  his  wonderful  powers  of  analysis.  In 
his  election,  representing  as  he  does  the  most 
brilliant  of  the  younger  and  progressive  school 
of  French  writers,  the  Academy  has  not  so  much 
honored  the  man  as  the  man  has  honored  the 
Academy. 

M.  Daudet's  opinion,  however,  is  interesting 
as  being  that  of  one  of  the  most  distinguished 
of  French  writers,  and  it  is  a  satire  which  costs 
something,  for  it  shuts  off  M.  Daudet  forever 
from  hope  of  election  to  the  body  at  which  he 
scoffs,  and  at  the  same  time  robs  him  of  the 
possibility  of  ever  enjoying  the  added  money 
value  which  attaches  to  each  book  that  bears 
the  leaves  of  the  Academy  on  its  title  -  page. 
Since  the  days  of  Richelieu,  Frenchmen  have 
mocked  at  this  institution,  and  Frenchmen  have 
given  up  years  of  their  lives  in  working,  schem- 
ing, and  praying  to  be  admitted  to  its  councils, 
and  died  disappointed,  and  bitterly  cursing  it  in 


THE   GRAND   PRIX   AND   OTHER   PRIZES  1 59 

their  hearts.  We  have  on  the  one  hand  the  fa- 
miliar story  of  Alexis  Piron,  who  had  engraved 
on  his  tombstone, 

"  Ci-gU  Piron,  qui  Jie  fiit  rien. 
Pas  ineine  Acadeinicien." 

And  on  the  other  there  is  the  present  picture  of 
M.  Zola  knocking  year  after  year  at  its  portals, 
asking  men  in  many  ways  his  inferior  to  permit 
him  a  right  to  sit  beside  them.  If  you  look  over 
its  lists  from  1635  to  the  present  day  you  will 
find  as  many  great  names  among  its  members  as 
those  which  are  missing  from  its  rolls ;  so  that 
proves  nothing. 

No  ridicule  can  disestablish  the  importance  of 
the  work  done  by  the  Academy  in  keeping  the 
French  language  pure,  or  the  value  of  its  Dic- 
tionary, or  the  incentive  which  it  gives  to  good 
work  by  examining  and  reporting  from  time  to 
time  on  literary,  scientific,  and  historical  works. 

A  short  time  ago  the  anarchists  of  Paris  deter- 
mined to  actively  ridicule  the  Academic  P^ran- 
gaise  by  putting  forth  a  foolish  person.  Citizen 
Achille  Le  Roy,  as  a  candidate  for  its  honors. 
As  a  preliminary  to  election  to  the  Academy  a 
candidate  must  call  upon  all  of  its  members.     It 


l6o  ABOUT   PARIS 

is  a  formality  which  may  be  considered  some- 
what humiHating,  as  it  suggests  begging  from 
door  to  door,  hat  in  hand ;  but  Citizen  Le  Roy 
made  his  round  of  visits  in  triumphal  state, 
dressed  in  the  cast-off  uniform  of  a  Bolivian  gen- 
eral, and  accompanied  by  a  band  of  music  and  a 
wagonette  full  of  journalists.  Wherever  he  was 
not  received  he  deposited  an  imitation  bomb  at 
the  door  of  the  member  who  had  refused  to  see 
him,  either  as  a  warning  or  as  a  joke,  and  much 
to  the  alarm  of  the  servants  who  opened  the 
door.  He  concluded  his  journey,  which  extend- 
ed over  several  days,  by  being  photographed  out- 
side of  the  door  of  the  Institute,  which  was,  of 
course,  the  only  side  of  the  door  which  he  will 
ever  see. 

The  Institute  of  France  stands  beyond  the 
bridges,  facing  the  Seine.  It  is  a  most  impres- 
sive and  ancient  pile,  built  around  a  great  court, 
and  guarded  by  statues  in  bronze  and  stone  of 
the  men  who  have  been  admitted  to  its  gates. 
The  ceremony  of  receiving  a  new  member  takes 
place  in  one  end  of  this  quadrangle  of  stone,  in  a 
little  round  hall,  not  so  large  as  the  auditorium 
of  a  New  York  theatre,  and  built  like  a  dissect- 
ing-room, with  three  rows  of  low-hanging  stone 
balconies  circling  the  entire  circumference  of  its 


THE   GRAND   PRIX   AND   OTHER   PRIZES  l6l 

walls.  One  part  of  the  lowest  balcony  is  divided 
into  two  large  boxes,  with  a  high  desk  between 
them,  and  a  flight  of  steps  leading  down  from  it 
into  the  pit,  which  is  packed  close  with  benches. 
In  one  of  these  boxes  sit  some  members  of  the 
Institute,  and  in  the  other  the  members  of  the 
Academic  Fran^aise,  which  is  only  one,  though 
the  best  known,  of  the  five  branches  into  which 
the  Institute  is  divided.  Behind  the  high  desk 
sits  the  President,  or,  as  he  is  called,  the  Secre- 
taire Perpetuel,  of  the  Academy,  with  a  mem- 
ber on  either  side.  It  is  the  duty  of  one  of 
these  to  read  the  address  of  welcome  to  the  in- 
coming mortal. 

It  is  a  very  pretty  sight  and  a  most  important 
function  in  the  social  world,  and  as  there  are  no 
reserved  places,  the  invited  ones  come  as  early 
as  eight  o'clock  in  the  morning  to  secure  a  good 
place,  although  the  brief  exercises  do  not  begin 
until  two  o'clock  in  the  afternoon.  At  that  hour 
the  street  outside  is  lined  with  long  rows  of  car- 
riages, guarded  by  the  smartest  of  English  coach- 
men, and  emblazoned  with  the  oldest  of  French 
coats-of-arms.  In  the  court-yard  there  is  a  flut- 
tering group  of  pretty  women  in  wonderful  toi- 
lets, surrounding  a  few  distinguished  -  looking 
men  with  ribbons  in  their  coats,  and  encircled 


l62  ABOUT   PARIS 

by  a  ring  of  journalists  making  notes  of  the  cos- 
tumes and  taking  down  the  names  of  the  social 
celebrities.  A  double  row  of  soldiers — for  the 
Institute  is  part  of  the  state  —  lines  the  main 
hall  leading  to  the  chamber,  and  salutes  all  who 
pass,  whether  men  or  women. 

I  was  so  unfortunate  as  to  arrive  very  late,  but 
as  I  came  in  with  the  American  ambassador  I 
secured  a  very  good  place,  although  a  most  awk- 
wardly conspicuous  one.  Three  old  gentlemen 
in  silk  knickerbockers  and  gold  chains  bowed 
the  ambassador  down  the  hall  between  the  sol- 
diers, and  out  on  to  the  steps  which  lead  from 
the  desk  between  the  boxes  in  which  sat  the 
Immortals.  There  they  placed  two  little  camp- 
stools  about  eight  inches  high,  on  which  they 
begged  us  to  be  seated.  There  was  not  another 
square  foot  of  space  in  the  entire  chamber  which 
was  not  occupied,  so  we  dropped  down  upon  the 
camp-stools.  We  were  as  conspicuous  as  you 
would  be  if  you  seated  yourself  on  top  of  the 
prompter's  box  on  the  stage  of  the  Grand  Opera- 
house,  and  I  felt  exactly,  after  the  audience  had 
examined  us  at  their  leisure,  as  though  the  Sec- 
retary was  about  to  suddenly  rap  on  his  desk 
and  auction  me  off  for  whatever  he  could  get. 
Still,  we  sat  among  the  Immortals,  if  only  for  an 


THE  GRAND   PRIX   AND   OTHER   PRIZES  163 

hour,  and  that  was  something.  The  venerable 
Secretary  peered  over  his  desk,  and  the  other 
Immortals  gazed  with  polite  curiosity,  for  the 
ambassador  had  only  just  arrived  in  Paris,  and 
was  not  yet  known. 

The  gentleman  on  the  right  of  the  Secretary 
was  Francois  Coppee,  a  very  handsome  man,  with 
a  strong,  kind  face,  smoothly  shaven,  and  sug- 
gesting a  priest  or  a  tragic  actor.  He  wore  the 
uniform  of  the  Academy,  which  Napoleon  spent 
much  time  in  devising.  It  consists  of  a  coat  of 
dark  green,  bordered  with  palm  leaves  in  a  light- 
er green  silk;  there  are,  too,  a  high  standing 
collar  and  a  white  waistcoat  and  a  pearl-handled 
sword.  The  poet  also  wore  a  great  many  deco- 
rations, and  smiled  kindly  upon  Mr.  Eustis  and 
myself,  with  apparently  great  amusement.  On 
the  other  side  of  the  President,  back  of  Mr. 
Eustis,  was  Comte  d'Haussonville ;  he  is  a  tall 
man  with  a  Vandyck  beard,  and  it  was  he  who 
was  to  read  the  address  of  welcome  to  the  Vi- 
comte  de  Bornier. 

Below  in  the  pit,  and  all  around  in  the  bal- 
conies, were  women  beautifully  dressed,  among 
whom  there  were  as  few  young  girls  as  there 
were  men.  These  were  the  most  interesting 
women   in    Parisian  society  —  the  ladies  of  the 


164  ABOUT   PARIS 

Faubourg  St.-Germain,  who  at  that  time  would 
have  appeared  at  scarce!}/  any  other  function, 
and  the  ladies  who  support  the  Revue  dcs  Deux 
Afondcs,  and  the  pretty  young  daughters  of  cham- 
pagne and  chocolate  making  papas  who  had  mar- 
ried ancient  titles,  and  who  try  to  emulate  in 
their  interests,  if  not  in  their  toilets,  their  more 
noble  sisters-in-law,  and  all  the  prettiest  women 
of  the  high  world,  as  well  as  the  sisters  of  pre- 
tenders to  the  throne  and  the  wife  of  President 
Carnot.  The  absence  of  men  was  very  notice- 
able; the  Immortals  seemed  to  have  it  all  to 
themselves,  and  it  looked  as  though  they  had 
purposely  refrained  from  asking  any  men,  or  that 
the  men  who  had  not  been  given  the  robe  of  im- 
mortality were  jealous,  and  so  stayed  away  of  their 
own  accord.  Those  who  were  there  either  looked 
bored,  or  else  posed  for  the  benefit  of  the  ladies, 
with  one  hand  in  the  opening  of  their  waistcoats, 
nodding  their  heads  approvingly  at  what  the 
speaker  said.  In  the  pit  I  recognized  M.  Blow- 
itz,  the  famous  correspondent  of  the  Times,  en- 
tirely surrounded  by  women.  He  wore  a  gray 
suit  and  a  flowing  white  tie,  and  he  did  not  seem 
to  be  having  a  very  good  time.  There  wxre  also 
among  the  Immortals  Jules  Simon,  and  Alexan- 
dre Dumas  fils,  dark-skinned,  with  little,  black. 


THE   GRAND  PRIX   AND   OTHER   PRIZES  165 

observant  eyes,  and  white,  curled  hair,  and  crisp 
mustache.  He  seemed  to  be  more  interested  in 
watching  the  women  than  in  Hstening  to  the 
speeches,  and  moved  restlessly  and  inattentively. 
When  the  exercises  were  over,  and  the  Academi- 
cians came  out  of  their  box  and  were  presented 
to  Mr.  Eustis,  Dumas  was  gravely  courteous, 
and  spoke  a  few  words  of  welcome  to  the  am- 
bassador in  a  formal,  distant  way,  and  then  hur- 
ried off  by  himself  without  waiting  to  chat  with 
the  women,  as  the  others  did.  He  was  the  most 
interesting  of  them  all  to  me,  and  the  least  in- 
terested in  what  was  going  on.  There  were  many 
others  there,  and  it  was  amusing  to  try  and 
fasten  to  them  the  names  of  Pasteur  and  Henri 
Meilhac,  Ludovic  Halevy,  and  the  Due  d'Au- 
male,  the  uncle  of  the  Comte  de  Paris,  who  was 
then  alive,  and  Benjamin  Constant,  who  had  the 
week  before  been  admitted  to  the  Institute. 
Some  of  them,  heavy-eyed  men,  with  great  firm 
jaws  and  heavy  foreheads,  wearing  their  braided 
coats  uneasily,  as  though  they  would  have  been 
more  comfortable  in  a  surgeon's  apron  or  a 
painter's  blouse,  kept  you  wondering  what  they 
had  done ;  and  others,  dapper  and  smiling  and 
obsequious,  made  you  ask  what  they  could  pos- 
sibly do, 


l66  ABOUT   PARIS 

The  Vicomte  Bornier  opened  the  proceedings 
by  reading  his  address  to  the  beautiful  ladies, 
with  his  cocked  hat  under  his  arm  and  his  moth- 
er-of-pearl sword  at  his  side,  and  I  am  afraid  it 
did  not  appeal  to  me  as  a  very  serious  business. 
It  was  too  suggestive  of  an  afternoon  tea.  There 
was  too  much  patting  of  kid-gloved  hands,  and 
too  many  women  altogether.  It  was  a  little  like 
Bunthorne  and  the  twenty  maidens.  If  the  lit- 
tle theatre  had  been  crowded  with  men  eager  to 
hear  what  this  new  light  in  literature  had  to  say, 
it  might  have  been  impressive,  but  the  sight  of 
forty  distinguished  men  sitting  apart  and  calling 
themselves  fine  names,  and  surrounded  by  wom- 
en who  believed  they  were  what  they  called 
themselves,  had  its  humorous  side.  I  could  not 
make  out  what  the  speech  w^as  about,  because 
the  French  was  too  good  ;  but  it  was  eminently 
characteristic  and  interesting  to  find  that  both 
Bornier  and  D'Haussonville  made  their  most 
successful  points  when  they  paid  compliments 
to  the  ladies  present,  or  to  womenkind  in  gen- 
eral, or  when  they  called  for  revenge  on  Ger- 
many. I  thought  it  curious  that  even  in  a  eulogy 
on  a  dead  man,  and  in  an  address  of  welcome  to 
a  live  one,  each  Frenchman  could  manage  to  in- 
troduce at  least  three  references  of  Alsace-Lor- 


K 
m 

w 
> 

> 

O 

2; 

W 

O 

> 
pa 
f 
O 


THE   GRAND   PRIX   AND   OTHER   PRIZES  169 

raine,  and  to  bow  and  make  pretty  speeches  to 
the  ladies  in  the  audience. 

There  is  a  pecuHarity  about  this  second  ad- 
dress which  is  worth  noting.  It  concerns  itself 
with  the  virtues  of  the  incoming  member,  and  as 
he  is  generally  puffed  up  with  honor,  the  address 
is  always  put  into  the  hands  of  one  whose  duty  it 
is  to  severely  criticise  and  undervalue  him  and 
his  words.  It  is  a  curious  idea  to  belittle  the 
man  whom  you  have  just  honored,  but  it  is  the 
custom,  and  as  both  speeches  are  submitted  to 
a  committee  before  they  are  read,  there  is  no 
very  hard  feeling.  It  is  only  in  the  address  read 
after  a  member's  death  that  he  is  eulogized,  and 
then  it  does  not  do  him  very  much  good.  On 
the  occasion  of  Pierre  I.oti's  admission  to  the 
Academy  he,  instead  of  eulogizing  the  man 
whose  place  he  had  taken,  lauded  his  own  meth- 
ods and  style  of  composition  so  greatly  that 
when  the  second  member  arose  he  prefaced  his 
remarks  by  suggesting  that  "  M.  Loti  has  said 
so  much  for  himself  that  he  has  left  me  nothing 
to  add." 

It  is  very  much  of  a  step  from  the  Academic 
Frangaise  to  the  Fete  of  Flowers  in  the  Bois  de 
Boulogne,  but  the  latter  comes  under  the  head  of 


I70  ABOUT   PARIS 

one  of  the  shows  of  Paris,  and  is  to  me  one  of  the 
prettiest  and  the  most  remarkable.  I  do  not  be- 
heve  that  it  could  be  successfully  carried  out  in 
any  other  city  in  the  world.  There  would  cer- 
tainly be  horse-play  and  roughness  to  spoil  it, 
and  it  is  only  the  Frenchman's  idea  of  gallantry 
and  the  good-nature  of  both  the  French  man  and 
woman  which  render  it  possible.  It  would  be  an 
easy  matter  to  hold  a  fete  of  flowers  at  Los  An- 
geles or  at  Nice,  or  in  any  small  city  or  watering- 
place  where  all  the  participants  would  know  one 
another  and  the  masses  would  be  content  to  act 
as  spectators;  but  to  venture  on  such  a  spec- 
tacle, and  to  throw  it  open  to  any  one  who  pays 
a  few  francs,  in  as  great  a  city  as  Paris,  requires, 
first  of  all,  the  highest  executive  ability  before 
the  artistic  and  pictorial  side  of  the  affair  is  con- 
sidered at  all,  and  the  most  hearty  co-operation 
of  the  state  or  local  government  with  the  citi- 
zens who  have  it  in  hand. 

On  the  day  of  the  fete  the  Allee  du  Jardin 
d'Acclimatation  in  the  Bois  is  reserved  absolute- 
ly for  the  combatants  in  this  annual  battle  of 
flowers,  which  begins  at  four  o'clock  in  the  after- 
noon and  lasts  uninterruptedly  until  dinner-time. 
Each  of  the  cross-roads  leading  up  to  the  Allee 
is  barricaded,  and  carriages  are  allowed  to  enter 


THE  GRAND   PRIX  AND  OTHER   PRIZES  171 

or  to  depart  only  at  either  end.  This  leaves  an 
open  stretch  of  road  several  miles  in  extent,  and 
wide  enough  for  four  rows  of  carriages  to  pass 
one  another  at  the  same  moment.  Thick  woods 
line  the  Allee  on  either  side,  and  the  branches 
of  the  trees  almost  touch  above  it.  Beneath 
them,  and  close  to  the  roadway,  sit  thousands  of 
men,  women,  and  children  in  close  rows,  and  back 
of  them  hundreds  more  move  up  and  down  the 
pathways.  The  carriages  proceed  in  four  un- 
broken lines,  two  going  up  and  two  going  down  ; 
and  as  they  pass,  the  occupants  pelt  each  other 
and  the  spectators  along  the  road-side  with  hand- 
fuls  of  flowers.  For  three  miles  this  battle  rages 
between  the  six  rows  of  people,  and  the  air  is 
filled  with  the  flying  missiles  and  shrieks  of 
laughter  and  the  most  graceful  of  compliments 
and  good-natured  blague.  At  every  fifty  yards 
stands  a  high  arch,  twined  with  festoons  trailing 
from  one  arch  to  the  next,  and  temporary  flag- 
poles flying  long  banners  of  the  tricolor,  and 
holding  shields  which  bear  the  monogram  of  the 
republic.  The  long  festoons  of  flowers  and  the 
flags  swinging  and  flying  against  the  dark  green 
of  the  trees  form  the  Allee  into  one  long  tunnel 
of  color  and  light ;  and  at  every  thirty  paces 
there  is  the  gleaming  cuirass  of  a  trooper,  with 


172  ABOUT    PARIS 

the  sun  shining  on  his  helmet  and  breastplate, 
and  on  other  steel  breastplates,  which  extend, 
like  the  mirrors  in  "Richard  III.,"  as  far  as  the 
eye  can  reach,  flashing  and  burning  in  the  sun. 
Between  these  beacons  of  steel,  and  under  the 
flags  and  flowers  and  green  branches,  move  near- 
ly eight  miles  of  carriages,  with  varnished  sides 
and  polished  leather  flickering  in  the  light,  each 
smothered  with  broad  colored  ribbons  and  flow- 
ers, and  gay  with  lace  parasols. 

It  is  a  most  cosmopolitan  crowd,  and  it  is  in- 
teresting to  see  how  seriously  some  of  the  occu- 
pants of  the  carriages  take  the  matter  in  hand, 
and  how  others  turn  it  into  an  ovation  for  them- 
selves, and  still  others  treat  it  as  an  excuse  to 
give  some  one  else  pleasure.  You  will  see  two 
Parisian  dandies  in  a  fiacre,  with  their  ammu- 
nition piled  as  high  as  their  knees,  saluting  and 
chaffing  and  calling  by  name  each  pretty  woman 
who  passes,  and  following  them  in  the  line  you 
will  see  a  respectable  family  carriage  contain- 
ing papa,  mamma,  and  the  babies,  and  with  the 
coachman  on  the  box  hidden  by  great  breast- 
works of  bouquets.  To  the  proud  parents  on 
the  back  seat  the  affair  is  one  which  is  to  be  met 
with  dignified  approval,  and  they  bow  politely  to 
whoever  hurls  a  rose  or  a  bunch  of  wild  flowers 


THE   GRAND   PRIX   AND   OTHER   PRIZES  173 

at  one  of  their  children.  They,  in  their  turn,  will 
be  followed  by  a  magnificent  victoria,  glittering 
with  varnish  and  emblazoned  by  strange  coats-of- 
arms,  and  holding  two  coal-black  negroes,  with 
faces  as  shiny  as  their  high  silk  hats.  They  have 
with  them  on  the  front  seat  a  hired  guide  from 
one  of  the  hotels,  who  is  showing  Paris  to  them, 
and  who  is  probably  telling  them  that  every 
woman  who  laughs  and  hits  them  with  a  flower  is 
a  duchess  at  least,  at  which  their  broad  faces  beam 
with  good-natured  embarrassment  and  their  teeth 
show,  and  they  scramble  up  and  empty  a  hand- 
ful of  rare  roses  over  the  lady's  departing  shoul- 
ders. There  are  frequent  halts  in  the  procession, 
which  moves  at  a  walk,  and  carriages  are  often 
left  standing  side  by  side  facing  opposite  ways 
for  the  space  of  a  minute,  in  which  time  there  is 
ample  opportunity  to  exhaust  most  of  the  am- 
munition at  hand,  or  to  express  thanks  for  the 
flowers  received.  The  good  order  of  the  day  is 
very  marked,  and  the  good  manners  as  well. 
The  flowers  are  not  accepted  as  missiles,  but  as 
tributes,  and  the  women  smile  and  nod  demure- 
ly, and  the  men  bow,  and  put  aside  a  pretty 
nosegay  for  the  next  meeting ;  and  when  they 
draw  near  the  same  carriage  again,  they  will 
smile  their  recognition,  and  wait  until  the  wheels 


174  ABOUT   PARIS 

are  just   drawing  away  from    one  another,  and 
then  heap  their  offerings  at  the  ladies'  feet. 

There  are  a  great  number  of  Americans  who 
are  only  in  Paris  for  the  month,  and  whom  you 
have  seen  on  the  steamer,  or  passing  up  the  Rue 
de  la  Paix,  or  at  the  banker's  on  mail  day,  and 
they  seize  this  chance  to  recognize  their  coun- 
trymen, and  grow  tremendously  excited  in  hit- 
ting each  other  in  the  eyes  and  on  the  nose,  and 
then  pass  each  other  the  next  day  in  the  Champs 
Elysees  without  the  movement  of  an  eyelash. 
The  hour  excuses  all.  It  has  the  freedom  of 
carnival-time  without  its  license,  and  it  is  pretty 
to  see  certain  women  posing  as  great  ladies,  in 
hired  fiacres,  and  being  treated  with  as  much  em- 
pressemeiit  and  courtesy  by  every  man  as  though 
he  believed  the  fiacre  was  not  hired,  and  the 
pearl  necklace  was  real  and  not  from  the  Palais 
Royal,  and  that  he  had  not  seen  the  woman  the 
night  before  circling  around  the  endless  tread- 
mill of  the  Jardin  de  Paris.  Sometimes  there 
will  be  a  coach  all  red  and  green  and  brass,  and 
sometimes  a  little  wicker  basket  on  low  wheels, 
with  a  donkey  in  the  shafts,  and  filled  with  chil- 
dren in  the  care  of  a  groom,  who  holds  them  by 
their  skirts  to  keep  them  from  hurling  themselves 
out  after  the  flowers,  and  who  looks  immensely 


THE   GRAND   PRIX  AND   OTHER   PRIZES  1 75 

pleased  whenever  any  one  pelts  them  back  and 
points  them  out  as  pretty  children.  But  the 
greater  number  of  the  children  stand  along  the 
roadside  with  their  sisters  and  mothers.  They 
are  of  the  good  bourgeois  class  and  of  the  de- 
cently poor,  who  beg  prettily  for  a  flower  instead 
of  giving  one,  and  who  dash  out  under  the  wheels 
for  those  that  fall  by  the  \vayside,  and  return 
with  them  to  the  safety  of  their  mother's  knee 
in  a  state  of  excited  triumph. 

When  you  see  how  much  one  of  the  broken 
flowers  means  to  them,  you  wonder  what  they 
think  of  the  cars  that  pass  toppling  over  with 
flowers,  with  the  harness  and  the  spokes  of  the 
wheels  picked  out  in  carnations,  and  banked  with 
shields  of  nodding  roses  at  the  sides  and  backs. 

These  are  the  carriages  entered  for  prizes,  and 
some  of  them  are  very  wonderful  and  very  beau- 
tiful. One  holds  a  group  of  Rastaqoueres,  who 
have  spent  a  clerk's  yearly  income  in  decorating 
their  victoria,  that  they  may  send  word  back  to 
South  America  that  they  have  won  a  prize  from 
a  board  of  Parisian  judges. 

And  another  is  a  big  billowy  phaeton  bloom- 
ing within  and  without  with  white  roses  and  car- 
nations, and  holding  a  beautiful  lady  with  auburn 
hair  and  powdered  face,  and  with  the  lace  of  her 


176  ABOUT   PARIS 

Empire  bonnet  just  falling  to  the  line  of  her  black 
eyebrows.  She  is  all  in  white  too,  with  white 
gloves,  and  a  parasol  of  nothing  but  white  lace, 
and  she  reclines  rather  than  sits  in  this  trium- 
phal car  of  pure  white  flowers,  like  a  Cleopatra  in 
her  barge,  or  Venus  lying  on  the  white  crest  of 
the  waves.  All  the  men  recognize  her,  and  throw 
their  choicest  offerings  into  her  lap  ;  but  when- 
ever I  saw  her  she  seemed  more  interested  in 
the  crowds  along  the  road-side,  who  announced 
her  approach  with  an  excited  murmur  of  admira- 
tion, and  the  little  children  in  blouses  threw  their 
nosegays  at  her,  and  then  stood  back,  abashed 
at  her  loveliness,  with  their  hands  behind  them. 
She  was  quite  used  to  being  pelted  with  flowers 
at  one  of  the  theatres,  but  she  seemed  to  enjoy 
this  tribute  very  much,  and  she  tossed  roses  back 
at  the  children,  and  watched  them  as  they  car- 
ried her  flowers  to  the  nurse  or  the  elder  sister 
who  was  taking  care  of  them,  and  who  looked 
after  the  woman  with  frightened,  admiring  eyes. 


V 

AMERICANS   IN   PARIS 

;MERICANS  who  go  to  Paris  might 
be  divided,  for  the  purposes  of  this 
article  at  least,  into  two  classes — 
those  who  use  Paris  for  their  own 
improvement  or  pleasure,  and  those  who  find  her 
too  strong  for  them,  and  who  go  down  before 
her  and  worship  her,  and  whom  she  either  fash- 
ions after  her  own  liking,  or  rides  under  foot  and 
neglects  until  they  lose  heart  and  disappear  for- 
ever. 

Balzac,  in  the  last  paragraph  of  one  of  his  nov- 
els, leaves  his  hero  standing  on  the  top  of  a  hill 
above  Paris,  shaking  his  fist  at  the  city  below 
him,  and  cursing  her  for  a  wanton. 

One  might  argue  that  this  was  a  somewhat 
childish  and  theatrical  point  of  view  for  the 
young  man  to  have  taken.  He  probably  found 
in  Paris  exactly  what  he  brought  there,  and  it 
seems  hardly  fair,  because  the  city  was  stronger 
than  he,  that  he  should  blame  her  and  call  her 


lyS  ABOUT   PARIS 

a  hard  name,  Paris  is  something  much  better 
than  that,  only  the  young  man  was  probably  not 
looking  for  anything  better.  He  had  taken  her 
frivolous  side  too  seriously,  and  had  not  sought 
for  her  better  side  at  all.  Some  one  should  have 
told  him  that  Paris  makes  a  most  agreeable  mis- 
tress, but  a  very  hard  master. 

There  are  a  few  Americans  who  do  not  know 
this  until  it  is  too  late,  until  they  lose  their 
heads  with  all  the  turmoil  and  beauty  and  un- 
ending pleasures  of  the  place,  and  grow  to  be- 
lieve that  the  voice  of  Paris  is  the  voice  of  the 
whole  world.  Perhaps  they  have  heard  the  voice 
speak  once;  it  has  praised  a  picture  which  they 
have  painted,  or  a  book  of  verses  that  they  have 
written,  or  a  garden  fete  that  they  have  given,  at 
which  there  were  present  as  many  as  three  am- 
bassadors. And  they  sit  breathless  ever  after, 
waiting  for  the  voice  to  speak  to  them  again, 
and  while  they  are  waiting  Paris  is  exclaiming 
over  some  new  picture,  or  another  fete,  at  which 
there  were  four  ambassadors  ;  and  the  poor  little 
artist  or  the  poor  little  social  struggler  wonders 
why  he  is  forgotten,  and  keeps  on  struggling  and 
fluttering  and  biting  his  nails  and  eating  his  heart 
out  in  private,  listening  for  the  voice  to  speak  his 
name  once  more. 


'LISTENING  FOR  THE  VOICE  TO  SPEAK  HIS  NAME  ONCE  MORE 


AMERICANS   IN    PARIS  iSl 

He  will  not  believe  that  his  time  has  come  and 
gone,  and  that  Paris  has  no  memory,  and  no  de- 
sire but  to  see  and  to  hear  some  new  thing.  She 
has  taken  his  money  and  eaten  his  dinners  and 
hung  his  pictures  once  or  twice  in  a  good  place ; 
but,  now  that  his  money  is  gone,  Paris  has  other 
dinners  to  eat,  and  other  statues  to  admire,  and 
no  leisure  time  to  spend  at  his  dull  receptions, 
which  have  taken  the  place  of  his  rare  dinners, 
or  to  climb  to  his  garret  when  there  is  a  more 
amusing  and  more  modern  painter  on  the  first 
floor. 

Paris  is  full  of  these  poor  hangers  -  on,  who 
have  allowed  her  to  use  them  and  pat  them  on 
the  back,  and  who  cannot  see  that  her  approba- 
tion is  not  the  only  reward  worth  the  striving 
for,  but  who  go  on  year  after  year  tagging  in 
her  train,  beseeching  her  to  take  some  notice  of 
them.  They  are  like  the  little  boys  who  run  be- 
side the  coaches  and  turn  somersaults  to  draw  a 
copper  from  the  passengers  on  top,  and  who  are 
finally  left  far  behind,  unobserved  and  forgotten 
beside  the  dusty  road.  The  wise  man  and  the 
sensible  man  takes  the  button  or  the  medal  or 
the  place  on  a  jury  that  Paris  gives  him,  and  is 
glad  to  get  it,  and  proud  of  the  recognition  and 
of  the  source  from  which  it  comes,  and  then  con- 


l82  ABOUT   PARIS 

tinues  on  his  way  unobserved,  working  for  the 
work's  sake.  He  knows  that  Paris  has  taught 
him  much,  but  that  she  has  given  him  all  she 
can,  and  that  he  must  now  work  out  his  own 
salvation  for  himself. 

Or.  if  he  be  merely  an  idler  visiting  Paris  for 
the  summer,  he  takes  Paris  as  an  idler  should, 
and  she  receives  him  with  open  arms.  He  does 
not  go  there  to  spend  four  hours  a  day,  or  even 
four  hours  a  week,  in  the  serious  occupation  of 
leaving  visiting-cards.  He  does  not  invite  the 
same  people  with  whom  he  dined  two  weeks 
before  in  New  York  to  dine  and  breakfast  with 
him  again  in  Paris,  nor  does  he  spend  every  af- 
ternoon in  a  frock-coat  watching  polo,  or  in  flan- 
nels playing  lawn-tennis  on  the  lie  de  Puteaux. 
He  has  tennis  and  polo  at  home.  Nor  did  he  go 
all  the  way  to  Paris  to  dance  in  little  hot  apart- 
ments, or  to  spend  the  greater  part  of  each  day 
at  the  race-tracks  of  Longchamps  or  Auteuil. 
The  Americans  who  do  these  things  in  Paris  are 
a  strange  and  incomprehensible  class.  Fortu- 
nately they  do  not  form  a  large  class,  but  they 
do  form  a  conspicuous  one,  and  while  it  really 
does  not  concern  any  one  but  themselves  as  to 
how  they  spend  their  time,  it  is  a  little  aggravat- 
ing to  have  them  spoiling  the  local  color  of  a  city 


AMERICANS    IN    PARIS  183 

for  which  they  have  no  real  appreciation,  and 
from  which  they  get  no  more  benefit  than  they 
would  have  received  had  they  remained  at  home 
in  Newport. 

They  treat  Paris  as  they  would  treat  Narragan- 
sett  Pier,  only  they  act  with  a  little  less  restraint, 
and  are  very  much  more  in  evidence.  They  are 
in  their  own  environment  and  in  the  picture  at 
the  Pier  or  at  the  Horse  Show,  and  if  you  do  not 
like  it  you  are  at  perfect  liberty  to  keep  out  of 
it,  and  you  will  not  be  missed ;  but  you  do  ob- 
ject to  have  your  view  of  the  Arc  de  Triomphe 
cut  in  two  by  a  coach-load  of  them,  or  to  have 
them  swoop  down  upon  D'Armenonville  or  Max- 
im's on  the  boulevards,  calling  each  other  by 
their  first  names,  and  running  from  table  to  ta- 
ble, and  ordering  the  Hungarians  to  play  "  Daisy 
Bell,"  until  you  begin  to  think  you  are  in  the 
hall  of  the  Hotel  Waldorf,  and  go  out  into  the 
night  to  hear  French  spoken,  if  only  by  a  cab- 
man. 

I  was  on  the  back  seat  of  a  coach  one  morn- 
ing in  the  Bois  de  Boulogne,  watching  Howlett 
give  a  man  a  lesson  in  driving  four  horses  at 
once. 

It  was  very  early,  and  the  dew  Avas  still  on  the 
trees,  and  the  great,  broad  avenues  were  empty 


l84  ABOUT   PARIS 

and  sweet-smelling  and  green,  and  I  exclaimed 
on  the  beauty  of  Paris.  "Beautiful?"  echoed 
Howlett.  "  I  should  say  it  was,  sir.  Now  in 
London,  sir,  all  the  roads  lie  so  straight  there's 
no  practice  driving  there.  But  in  Paris  it's  all 
turns  and  short  corners.  It's  the  most  beautiful 
city  in  the  world."  I  thought  it  was  interesting 
to  find  a  man  so  wrapped  up  in  his  chosen  work 
that  he  could  see  nothing  in  the  French  capital 
but  the  angles  which  made  the  driving  of  four 
horses  a  matter  of  some  skill.  But  what  interest 
can  you  take  in  those  Americans  who  have  been 
taught  something  else  besides  driving,  and  who 
yet  see  only  those  things  in  Paris  that  are  of  quite 
as  little  worth  as  the  sharp  turns  of  the  street 
corners  ? 

You  wonder  if  it  never  occurs  to  them  to  walk 
along  the  banks  of  the  Seine  and  look  over  the 
side  at  the  people  unloading  canal-boats,  or  clip- 
ping poodles,  or  watering  cavalry  horses,  or  pa- 
tiently fishing;  if  they  never  pull  over  the  books 
in  the  stalls  that  line  the  quays,  or  just  loiter  in 
abject  laziness,  with  their  arms  on  the  parapet  of 
a  bridge,  with  the  sun  on  their  backs,  and  the 
steamboats  darting  to  and  fro  beneath  them, 
and  with  the  towers  of  Notre  Dame  before  and 
the  grim  prison  of  the  Conciergerie  on  one  side. 


AMERICANS   IN   PARIS  185 

Surely  this  is  a  better  employment  than  taking 
tea  to  the  music  of  a  Hungarian  band  while 
your  young  friends  from  Beverly  Farms  and 
Rockaway  knock  a  polo-ball  around  a  ten-acre 
lot.  I  met  two  American  women  hurrying  along 
the  Rue  de  Rivoli  one  morning  last  summer  who 
told  me  that  they  had  just  arrived  in  Paris  that 
moment,  and  were  about  to  leave  two  hours  later 
for  Havre  to  take  the  steamer  home. 

"  So,"  explained  the  elder,  "  as  we  have  so 
much  time,  we  are  just  running  down  to  the 
Louvre  to  take  a  farewell  look  at  '  Mona  Lisa' 
and  the  '  Winged  Victory ;'  we  won't  see  them 
again  for  a  year,  perhaps."  Their  conduct  struck 
me  as  interesting  when  compared  with  that  of 
about  four  hundred  other  American  girls,  who 
never  see  anything  of  Paris  during  their  four 
weeks'  stay  there  each  summer,  because  so  much 
of  their  time  is  taken  up  at  the  dress-makers'.  It 
is  pathetic  to  see  them  come  back  to  the  hotel 
at  five,  tired  out  and  cross,  with  having  had  to 
stand  on  their  feet  four  hours  at  a  time  while 
some  mysterious  ceremony  was  going  forward. 
It  is  hard  on  them  when  the  sun  is  shining  out- 
of-doors  and  there  are  beautiful  drives  and  great 
art  galleries  and  quaint  old  chapels  and  curious 
museums  and  ancient   gardens   lying   free   and 


l86  ABOUT    PARIS 

open  all  around  them,  that  they  should  be  com- 
pelled to  spend  four  weeks  in  this  fashion. 

There  was  a  young  woman  of  this  class  of 
American  visitors  to  Paris  who  had  just  arrived 
there  on  her  way  from  Rome,  and  who  was  tell- 
ing us  how  much  she  had  delighted  in  the  gal- 
leries there.  She  was  complaining  that  she  had 
no  more  pictures  to  enjoy.  Some  one  asked  her 
what  objection  she  had  to  the  Louvre  or  the 
Luxembourg. 

"  Oh,  none  at  all,"  she  said  ;  "  but  I  saw  those 
pictures  last  year." 

These  are  the  Americans  who  go  to  Paris  for 
the  spring  and  summer  only,  who  live  in  hotels, 
and  see  little  of  the  city  beyond  the  Rue  de  la 
Paix  and  the  Avenue  of  the  Champs  Elysees  and 
their  bankers'.  They  get  a  great  deal  of  pleas- 
ure out  of  their  visit,  however,  and  they  learn 
how  important  a  thing  it  is  to  speak  French  cor- 
rectly. If  they  derive  no  other  benefit  from  their 
visit  they  are  sufficiently  justified,  and  when  we 
contrast  them  with  other  Americans  who  have 
made  Paris  their  chosen  home,  they  almost  shine 
as  public  benefactors  in  comparison. 

For  they,  at  least,  bring  something  back  to 
their  own  country:  themselves,  and  pretty  frocks 
and  bonnets,  and  a  certain  wider  knowledge  of 


STANDING   ON   THEIR   FEET   FOR    HOURS   AT   A   TIME' 


AMERICANS   IN   PARIS  I89 

the  world.     That  is  not  much,  but  it  is  more 
than  the  American  Colony  does. 

There  is  something  fine  in  the  idea  of  a  colo- 
ny, of  a  body  of  men  and  women  who  strike  out 
for  themselves  in  a  new  country,  who  cut  out 
their  homes  in  primeval  forests,  and  who  make 
their  peace  with  the  native  barbarians.  The  Pil- 
grim Fathers  and  the  early  settlers  in  Australia 
and  South  Africa  and  amidst  the  snows  of  Cana- 
da were  colonists  of  whom  any  mother- nation 
might  be  proud ;  but  the  emigrants  who  shrink 
at  the  crudeness  of  our  present  American  civiliza- 
tion, who  shirk  the  responsibilities  of  our  govern- 
ment, who  must  have  a  leisure  class  with  which 
to  play,  and  who  are  shocked  by  the  familiarity 
of  our  press,  are  colonists  who  leave  their  coun- 
try for  their  country's  good.  The  American  Col- 
ony in  Paris  is  in  a  strange  position.  Its  mem- 
bers are  neither  the  one  thing  nor  the  other. 
They  cannot  stand  in  the  shadow  of  the  Arc  de 
Triomphe  and  feel  that  any  part  of  its  glory  falls 
on  them,  nor  can  they  pretend  an  interest  in  the 
defeat  of  Tammany  Hall,  nor  claim  any  portion 
in  the  magnificent  triumph  of  the  Chicago  Fair. 
Their  attitude  must  always  be  one  of  explana- 
tion ;  they  are  continually  on  the  defensive ; 
they    apologize    to    the    American    visitor    and 


190  ABOUT   PARIS 

to  the  native  Frenchman  ;  they  have  dechned 
their  birthright  and  are  voluntary  exiles  from 
their  home.  The  only  way  by  which  they  can 
justify  their  action  is  either  to  belittle  what  they 
have  given  up,  or  to  emphasize  the  benefits  which 
they  have  received  in  exchange,  and  these  bene- 
fits are  hardly  perceptible.  They  remain  what 
they  are,  and  no  matter  how  long  it  may  have 
been  since  they  ceased  to  be  Americans,  they  do 
not  become  Frenchmen.  They  are  a  race  all  to 
themselves  ;  they  are  the  American  Colony. 

On  regular  occasions  this  Colony  asserts  itself, 
but  only  on  those  occasions  when  there  is  a 
chance  of  its  advertising  itself  at  the  expense  of 
the  country  it  has  renounced.  When  this  chance 
comes  the  Colonists  suddenly  remember  their 
former  home  ;  they  rush  into  print,  or  they  make 
speeches  in  public  places,  or  buy  wreaths  for 
some  dead  celebrity.  Or  when  it  so  happens 
that  no  one  of  prominence  has  died  for  some 
time,  and  there  seems  to  be  no  other  way  of  get- 
ting themselves  noticed,  the  American  Colony 
rises  in  its  strength  and  remembers  Lafayette, 
and  decorates  his  grave.  Once  every  month  or 
so  they  march  out  into  the  country  and  lay  a 
wreath  on  his  tomb,  and  so  for  the  moment  gain  a 
certain  vogue  with  the  Parisians,  which  is  all  that 


AMERICANS   IN   PARIS  IQI 

they  ask.  They  do  not  perform  this  ceremony 
because  Lafayette  fought  in  America,  but  be- 
cause he  was  a  Frenchman  fighting  in  America, 
and  they  are  playing  now  to  the  French  galler- 
ies and  not  to  the  American  bleaching -boards. 
There  are  a  few  descendants  of  Lafayette  who 
are  deserving  of  our  sincere  sj'mpathy.  For 
these  gentlemen  are  brought  into  the  suburbs 
many  times  a  year  in  the  rain  and  storm  to  watch 
different  American  Colonists  place  a  wreath  on 
the  tomb  of  their  distinguished  ancestor,  and 
make  speeches  about  a  man  who  left  his  country 
only  to  fight  for  the  independence  of  another 
country,  and  not  to  live  in  it  after  it  was  free. 
Some  day  the  descendants  of  Lafayette  and  the 
secretaries  of  the  American  embassy  will  rise  up 
and  rebel,  and  refuse  to  lend  themselves  longer 
to  the  uses  of  these  gentlemen. 

They  will  suggest  that  there  are  other  graves 
in  Paris.  There  is,  for  instance,  the  grave  of 
Paul  Jones,  who  possibly  did  as  much  for  Ameri- 
ca on  the  sea  as  Lafayette  did  on  shore.  If  he 
had  only  been  a  Frenchman,  with  a  few  descend- 
ants of  title  still  living  who  would  consent  to 
act  as  chief  mourners  on  occasion,  his  spirit 
might  hope  to  be  occasionally  remembered  with 
a  wreath  or  two ;  but  as  it  is,  he  is  not  to  be  con- 


192  ABOUT   PARIS 

sidered  with  the  French  marquis,  who  must,  we 
can  well  imagine,  turn  uneasily  beneath  the 
wreaths  these  self- advertising  patriots  lay  upon 
his  grave. 

The  American  Colony  is  not  wicked,  but  it 
would  like  to  be  thought  so,  which  is  much 
worse.  Among  some  of  the  men  it  is  a  pose  to 
be  considered  the  friend  of  this  or  that  particu- 
lar married  woman,  and  each  of  them,  instead  of 
paying  the  woman  the  slight  tribute  of  treating 
her  in  public  as  though  they  were  the  merest  ac- 
quaintances, which  is  the  least  the  man  can  do, 
rather  forces  himself  upon  her  horizon,  and  is  al- 
ways in  evidence,  not  obnoxiously,  but  unobtru- 
sively, like  a  pet  cat  or  a  butler,  but  still  with 
sufficient  pertinacity  to  let  you  know  that  he  is 
there. 

As  a  matter  of  fact  the  women  have  not  the 
courage  to  carry  out  to  the  end  these  affairs  of 
which  they  hint,  as  have  the  French  men  and 
women  around  them  whose  example  they  are  try- 
ing to  emulate.  And,  moreover,  the  twenty-five 
years  of  virtue  which  they  have  spent  in  Ameri- 
ca, as  Balzac  has  pointed  out,  is  not  to  be  over- 
come in  a  day  or  in  many  days,  and  so  they  only 
pretend  to  have  overcome  it,  and  tell  risquds  sto- 
ries and  talk  scandalously  of  each  other  and  even 


AMERICANS   IN    PARIS  193 

of  young  girls.  But  it  all  begins  and  ends  in 
talk,  and  the  risquc's  stories,  if  they  knew  it,  sound 
rather  silly  from  their  lips,  especially  to  men  who 
put  them  away  when  they  were  boys  at  board- 
ing-school, and  when  they  were  so  young  that 
they  thought  it  was  grand  to  be  vulgar  and  man- 
ly to  be  nasty. 

It  is  a  question  whether  or  not  one  should  be 
pleased  that  the  would-be  wicked  American  wom- 
an in  Paris  cannot  adopt  the  point  of  view  of 
the  Parisian  women  as  easily  as  she  adopts  their 
bonnets.  She  tries  to  do  so,  it  is  true  ;  she  tries 
to  look  on  life  from  the  same  side,  but  she  does 
not  succeed  very  well,  and  you  may  be  sure  she 
is  afraid  and  a  fraud  at  heart,  and  in  private  a 
most  excellent  wife  and  mother.  If  it  be  repre- 
hensible to  be  a  hypocrite  and  to  pretend  to  be 
better  than  one  is,  it  should  also  be  wrong  to 
pretend  to  be  worse  than  one  dares  to  be,  and  so 
lend  countenance  to  others.  It  is  like  a  man 
who  shouts  with  the  mob,  but  whose  sympathies 
are  against  it.  The  mob  only  hears  him  shout 
and  takes  courage  at  his  doing  so,  and  continues 
in  consequence  to  destroy  things.  And  these 
foolish,  pretty  women  lend  countenance  by  their 
talk  and  by  their  stories  to  many  things  of  which 
they  know  nothing  from  experience,  and  so  do 
13 


194 


ABOUT   PARIS 


themselves  injustice  and  others  much  harm. 
Sometimes  it  happens  that  an  outsider  brings 
them  up  with  a  sharp  turn,  and  shows  them  how 
far  they  have  strayed  from  the  standard  which 
they  recognized  at  home.  I  remember,  as  an  in- 
stance of  this,  how  an  American  art  student  told 
me  with  much  satisfaction  last  summer  of  how 
he  had  made  himself  intensely  disagreeable  at  a 
dinner  given  by  one  of  these  expatriated  Ameri- 
cans. "  I  didn't  mind  their  taking  away  the  char- 
acter of  every  married  woman  they  knew,"  he 
said  ;  "  they  were  their  own  friends,  not  mine  ; 
but  I  did  object  when  they  began  on  the  young 
girls,  for  that  is  something  we  haven't  learned  at 

home  yet.    And  finally  they  got  to  Miss , 

and  one  of  the  women  said,  '  Oh,  she  has  so  com- 
promised herself  now  that  no  one  will  marry 
her.'  " 

At  which,  it  seems,  my  young  man  banged  the 
table  with  his  fist,  and  said  :  "  I'll  marry  her,  if 
she'll  have  me,  and  I  know  twenty  more  men  at 
home  who  would  be  glad  of  the  chance.  We've 
all  asked  her  once,  and  we're  willing  to  ask  her 
again." 

There  was  an  uncomfortable  pause,  and  the 
young  woman  who  had  spoken  protested  she  had 
not  meant  it  so  seriously.     She  had  only  meant 


"the  AMERICAN  COLONY  IS  NOT  WICKED" 


AMERICANS   IN   PARIS  1 97 

the  girl  was  a  tnfie />assee  and  travel- worn.  But 
when  the  women  had  left  the  table,  one  of  the 
men  laughed,  and  said  : 

"  You  are  quite  like  a  breeze  from  the  piny 
woods  at  home.  I  suppose  we  do  talk  rather 
thoughtlessly  over  here,  but  then  none  of  us 
take  what  we  say  of  each  other  as  absolute  truth." 

The  other  men  all  agreed  to  this,  and  protest- 
ed that  no  one  took  them  or  what  they  said  seri- 
ously. They  were  quite  right,  and,  as  a  matter  of 
fact,  it  would  be  unjust  to  them  to  do  so,  except 
to  pity  them.  The  Man  without  a  Country  was 
no  more  unfortunate  than  they.  It  is  true  they 
have  Henry's  bar,  where  they  can  get  real  Amer- 
ican cocktails,  and  the  Travellers',  where  they 
can  play  real  American  poker ;  but  that  is  as 
near  as  they  ever  get  to  anything  that  savors  of 
our  country,  and  they  do  not  get  as  near  as  that 
towards  anything  that  savors  of  the  Frenchman's 
country.  They  have  their  own  social  successes, 
and  their  own  salons  and  dinner-parties,  but  the 
Faubourg  St.  -  Germain  is  as  strange  a  territory 
to  many  of  them  as  though  it  were  situated  in 
the  heart  of  the  Congo  Basin. 

Of  course  there  are  many  fine,  charming,  whole- 
souled,  and  clean -minded  American  women  in 
Paris.     They  are  the  wives  of  bankers  or  mer- 


198  ABOUT   PARIS 

chants  or  the  representatives  of  the  firms  which 
have  their  branches  in  Paris  and  London  as  well 
as  New  York.  And  there  are  hundreds  more  of 
Americans  who  are  in  Paris  because  of  its  art,  the 
cheapness  of  its  living,  and  its  beauty.  I  am  not 
speaking  of  them,  and  should  they  read  this  they 
will  understand. 

The  American  in  Paris  of  whom  one  longest 
hesitates  to  speak  is  the  girl  or  woman  who  has 
married  a  title.  She  has  been  so  much  misrepre- 
sented in  the  press,  and  so  misunderstood,  and 
she  suffers  in  some  cases  so  acutely  without  let- 
ting it  be  known  how  much  she  suffers,  that  the 
kindest  word  that  could  be  said  of  her  is  not  half 
so  kind  as  silence.  No  one  can  tell  her  more  dis- 
tinctly than  she  herself  knows  what  her  lot  is,  or 
how  few  of  her  illusions  have  been  realized.  It 
is  not  a  case  where  one  can  point  out  grandilo- 
quently that  uneasy  lies  the  head  that  wears  a 
coronet ;  it  is  not  magnificent  sorrow  ;  it  is  just 
pathetic,  sordid,  and  occasionally  ridiculous.  To 
treat  it  too  seriously  would  be  as  absurd  as  to 
weep  over  a  man  who  had  allowed  himself  to  be 
fooled  by  a  thimblerigger ;  only  in  this  case  it  is 
a  woman  who  has  been  imposed  upon,  and  who 
asks  for  your  sympathy. 

There   is  a  very  excellent   comic   song  which 


AMERICANS    IN    PARIS  199 

points  out  how  certain  things  are  only  EngHsh 
when  you  see  them  on  Broadway;  and  a  title,  or 
the  satisfaction  of  being  a  countess  or  princess, 
when  viewed  from  a  Broadway  or  Fifth  Avenue 
point  of  view,  is  a  very  pretty  and  desirable  ob- 
ject. But  as  the  title  has  to  be  worn  in  Paris  and 
not  in  New  York,  its  importance  lies  in  the  way 
in  which  it  is  considered  there,  not  here.  As  far 
as  appears  on  the  surface,  the  American  woman 
of  title  in  Paris  fails  to  win  what  she  sought,  from 
either  her  own  people  or  those  among  whom  she 
has  married.  To  her  friends  from  New  York  or 
San  Francisco  she  is  still  Sallie  This  or  Eleanor 
That.  Her  friends  are  not  deceived  or  im- 
pressed or  overcome  —  at  least,  not  in  Paris. 
When  they  return  to  New  York  they  speak  cas- 
ually of  how  they  have  been  spending  the  sum- 
mer with  the  Princess  So -and -So,  and  they  do 
not  add  that  she  used  to  be  Sallie  Sprigs  of  San 
Francisco.  But  in  Paris,  when  they  are  with  her, 
they  call  her  Sallie,  just  as  of  yore,  and  they  let 
her  understand  that  they  do  not  consider  her  in 
any  way  changed  since  she  has  become  enno- 
bled, or  that  the  glamour  of  her  rank  in  any 
way  dazzles  them.  And  she  in  her  turn  is  so 
anxious  that  they  shall  have  nothing  to  say  of 
her  to  her  disadvantage  when  they  return  that 


200  ABOUT   PARIS 

she  shows  them  little  of  her  altered  state,  and  is 
careful  not  to  refer  to  any  of  the  interesting 
names  on  her  new  visiting-list. 

Her  husband's  relations  in  France  are  more 
disappointing  :  they  certainly  cannot  be  expect- 
ed to  see  her  in  any  different  light  from  that  of 
an  outsider  and  a  nobody ;  they  will  not  even 
admit  that  she  is  pretty ;  and  they  say  among 
themselves  that,  so  long  as  Cousin  Charles  had 
to  marry  a  great  fortune,  it  is  a  pity  he  did  not 
marry  a  French  woman,  and  that  they  always 
had  preferred  the  daughter  of  the  chocolate- 
maker,  or  the  champagne-grower,  or  the  Hebrew 
banker — all  of  whom  were  offered  to  him.  The 
American  princess  cannot  expect  people  who 
have  had  title  and  ancestors  so  long  as  to  have 
forgotten  them  to  look  upon  Sallie  Sprigs  of 
California  as  anything  better  than  an  Indian 
squaw.  And  the  result  is,  that  all  which  the 
American  woman  makes  by  her  marriage  is  the 
privilege  of  putting  her  coronet  on  her  handker- 
chief and  the  humble  deference  of  the  women 
at  Paquin's  or  Virot's,  who  say  "  Madame  the 
Baroness  "  and  "  Madame  the  Princess  "  at  every 
second  word.  It  really  seems  a  very  heavy  price 
to  pay  for  very  little. 

We  are  attributing  very  trivial  and  vulgar  mo- 


AMERICANS    IN    PARIS  20I 

tives  to  the  woman,  and  it  may  be,  after  all,  that 
she  married  for  love  in  spite  of  the  title,  and  not 
on  account  of  it.  But  if  these  are  love-matches, 
it  would  surely  sometimes  happen  that  the  Amer- 
ican men,  in  their  turn,  would  fall  in  love  with 
foreign  women  of  title,  and  that  we  would  hear 
of  impecunious  princesses  and  countesses  hunt- 
ing through  the  States  for  rich  brokers  and 
wheat-dealers.  Of  course  the  obvious  answer  to 
this  is  that  the  American  women  are  so  much 
more  attractive  than  the  men  that  they  appeal 
to  people  of  all  nations  and  of  every  rank,  and 
that  American  men  are  content  to  take  them 
without  the  title. 

The  rich  fathers  of  the  young  girls  who  are 
sacrificed  should  go  into  the  business  with  a 
more  accurate  knowledge  of  what  they  are  buy- 
ing. Even  the  shrewdest  of  them  —  men  who 
could  not  be  misled  into  buying  a  worthless 
railroad  or  an  empty  mine — are  frequently  im- 
posed upon  in  these  speculations.  The  reason 
is  that  while  they  have  made  a  study  of  the 
relative  values  and  the  soundness  of  railroads 
and  mines,  they  have  not  taken  the  pains  to 
study  this  question  of  titles,  and  as  long  as 
a  man  is  a  count  or  a  prince,  they  inquire  no 
further,    and    one    of   them    buys    him    for    his 


202  ABOUT  PARIS 

daughter  on  his  face  value.  There  should  be 
a  sort  of  Bradstreet  for  these  rich  parents,  which 
they  could  consult  before  investing  so  much 
money  plus  a  young  girl's  happiness.  There 
are,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  only  a  very  few  titles 
worth  buying,  and  in  selecting  the  choice  should 
always  lie  between  one  of  England  and  one  of 
Germany.  An  English  earl  is  the  best  the  Amer- 
ican heiress  can  reasonably  hope  for,  and  after 
him  a  husband  with  a  German  title  is  very  desira- 
ble. These  might  be  rated  as  "  sure  "  and  "  safe  " 
investments. 

But  these  French  titles  created  by  Napoleon, 
or  the  Italians,  with  titles  created  by  the  Papal 
Court,  and  the  small  fry  of  other  countries,  are 
really  not  worth  while.  Theirs  are  not  titles ;  as 
some  one  has  said,  they  are  epitaphs  ;  and  the 
best  thing  to  do  with  the  young  American  girl 
who  thinks  she  would  like  to  be  a  princess  is 
to  take  her  abroad  early  in  her  life,  and  let  her 
meet  a  few  other  American  girls  who  have  be- 
come princesses.  After  that,  if  she  still  wants  to 
buy  a  prince  and  pay  his  debts  and  supply  him 
with  the  credit  to  run  into  more  debt,  she  has 
only  herself  to  blame,  and  goes  into  it  with  her 
pretty  eyes  wide  open.  It  will  be  then  only  too 
evident  that  she  is  fitted  for  nothinsf  hicrher. 


'■  WHAT    MIGHT    SOME   TIME   HAPPEN    IF   THESE   WERE   LOVE- 
MATCHES " 


AMERICANS    IN    PARIS  205 

On  no  one  class  of  visitor  does  Paris  lay  her 
spell  more  heavily  than  on  the  American  art 
student.  For,  no  matter  where  he  has  studied 
at  home,  or  under  what  master,  he  finds  when 
he  reaches  Paris  so  much  that  is  new  and  beau- 
tiful and  full  of  inspiration  that  he  becomes  as 
intolerant  as  are  all  recent  converts,  and  so  hap- 
py in  his  chosen  profession  that  he  looks  upon 
everything  else  than  art  with  impatience  and 
contempt.  As  art  is  something  about  which 
there  are  many  opinions,  he  too  often  passes 
rapidly  on  to  the  stage  when  he  can  see  nothing 
to  admire  in  any  work  save  that  which  the  mas- 
ter that  he  worships  declares  to  be  true,  and  he 
scorns  every  other  form  of  expression  and  every 
other  school  and  every  other  artist. 

You  almost  envy  the  young  man  his  certainty 
of  mind  and  the  unquestionableness  of  his  opin- 
ion. He  will  take  you  through  the  Salon  at  a 
quick  step,  demolishing  whole  walls  of  pictures 
as  he  goes  with  a  sweeping  gesture  of  the  hand, 
and  will  finally  bring  you  breathless  before  a  lit- 
tle picture,  or  a  group  of  them,  which,  so  he  in- 
forms you,  are  the  only  ones  in  the  exhibition 
worthy  of  consideration.  And  on  the  day  fol- 
lowing a  young  disciple  of  another  school  will  es- 
cort you   through   the  same  rooms,   and  regard 


2o6  ABOUT    PARIS 

with  pitying  contempt  the  pictures  which  your 
friend  of  the  day  before  has  left  standing,  and 
will  pick  out  somewhere  near  the  roof  a  strange 
monstrosity,  beneath  which  he  will  stand  with 
bowed  head,  and  upon  which  he  will  comment  in 
a  whisper. 

It  is  an  amusing  pose,  and  most  bewildering 
to  a  philistine  like  myself  when  he  finds  all  the 
artists  whom  he  had  venerated  denounced  as 
photographers  and  decorators,  or  story-tellers 
and  illustrators,  I  used  to  be  quite  ashamed  of 
the  ignorance  which  had  left  me  so  long  unen- 
lightened as  to  what  was  true  and  beautiful. 

These  boys  have,  perhaps,  an  aunt  in  Kansas 
City,  or  a  mother  in  Lynn,  Massachusetts,  who 
is  saving  and  pinching  to  send  them  fifteen  or 
twenty  dollars  a  week  so  that  they  can  learn  to 
be  great  painters,  and  they  have  not  been  in 
Paris  a  week  before  they  have  changed  their 
entire  view  of  art,  and  adopted  a  new  method 
and  a  new  master  and  a  new  religion.  It  is  no- 
wise derogatory  to  a  boy  to  be  supported  by  a 
fond  aunt  in  Kansas  City,  who  sends  him  fifteen 
dollars  a  week  and  the  news  of  the  social  life  of 
that  place,  but  it  is  amusing  to  think  how  she 
and  his  cousins  in  the  West  would  be  awed  if 
they  heard  him  damn  a  picture  by  waving  his 


AMERICANS    IN    PARIS  10^ 

thumb  in  the  air  at  it,  and  saying,  "  It  has  a  lit- 
tle too  much  of  that,"  with  a  downward  sweep 
of  the  thumb,  "  and  not  enough  of  this,"  with  an 
upward  sweep.  For  one  hardly  expects  a  youth 
who  is  still  at  Julien's,  and  who  has  not  yet  paid 
the  first  quarter's  rent  for  his  studio,  to  proclaim 
all  the  first  painters  of  France  as  only  fit  to  col- 
or photographs.  It  is  as  if  some  one  were  to 
say,  "  You  can  take  away  all  of  the  books  of  the 
Boston  Library  and  nothing  will  be  lost,  but 
spare  three  volumes  of  sonnets  written  by  the 
only  great  writer  of  the  present  time,  who  is  a 
friend  of  mine,  and  of  whom  no  one  knows  but 
myself." 

Of  course  one  must  admire  loyalty  of  that  sort, 
for  when  it  is  loyalty  to  an  idea  it  cannot  help 
but  be  fine  and  sometimes  noble,  though  it  is  a 
trifle  amusing  as  well.  It  is  just  this  tenacity  of 
belief  in  one's  own  work,  and  just  this  intolerance 
of  the  work  of  others,  that  make  Paris  inspiring. 
A  man  cannot  help  but  be  in  earnest,  if  he 
amounts  to  anything  at  all,  when  on  every  side 
he  hears  his  work  attacked  or  vaunted  to  the 
skies.  As  long  as  the  question  asked  is  "  Is  it 
art  ?"  and  not  "  Will  it  sell  ?"  and  "■  Is  it  popu- 
lar ?"  the  influence  must  be  for  good. 

These  students,  in  their  loyalty  to  the  particu- 


2o8  ABOUT   PARIS 

lar  school  they  admire,  of  course  proclaim  their 
belief  in  every  public  and  private  place,  and  are 
ever  on  their  guard,  but  it  is  in  their  studios  that 
they  have  set  up  their  gods  and  established  their 
doctrines  most  firmly. 

One  of  these  young  men,  whom  I  had  known 
at  college,  took  me  to  his  studio  last  summer, 
and  asked  me  to  tell  him  how  I  liked  it.  It 
was  a  most  embarrassing  question  to  me,  for  to 
my  untrained  eye  the  rooms  seemed  to  be  strick- 
en with  poverty,  and  so  bare  as  to  appear  unten- 
anted. I  said,  at  last,  that  he  had  a  very  fine 
view  from  his  windows. 

"  Yes,  but  you  say  nothing  of  the  room  it- 
self," he  protested  ;  "  and  I  have  spent  so  much 
time  and  thought  on  it.  I  have  been  a  year  and 
a  half  in  arranging  this  room." 

"  But  there  is  nothing  in  it,"  I  objected;  "you 
couldn't  have  taken  a  year  and  a  half  to  arrange 
these  things.  There  is  not  enough  of  them.  It 
shouldn't  have  taken  more  than  half  an  hour." 

He  smiled  with  a  sweet,  superior  smile,  and 
shook  his  head  at  me.  "  I  am  afraid,"  he  said, 
"  that  you  are  one  of  those  people  who  like  stu- 
dios filled  with  tapestries  and  armor  and  palms 
and  huge,  hideous  chests  of  carved  wood.  You 
are  probably  the  sort  of  person  who  would  hang 


AMERICANS   IN    PARIS  209 

a  tennis-racket  on  his  wall  and  consider  it  deco- 
rative. IVc  believe  in  lines  and  subdued  colors 
and  broad,  bare  surfaces.  There  is  nothing  in 
this  room  that  has  not  a  meaning  of  its  own. 
You  are  quite  right  ;  there  is  very  little  in  it  ; 
but  what  is  here  could  not  be  altered  or  changed 
without  spoiling  the  harmony  of  the  whole,  and 
nothing  in  it  could  be  replaced  or  improved 
upon." 

I  regarded  the  studio  with  renewed  interest  at 
this,  and  took  a  mental  inventory  of  its  contents 
for  my  own  improvement.  I  was  guiltily  con- 
scious that  once  at  college  I  had  placed  two  la- 
crosse-sticks over  my  doorway,  and  what  made  it 
worse  was  that  I  did  not  play  lacrosse,  and  that 
they  had  been  borrowed  from  the  man  up-stairs 
for  decorative  purposes  solely.  I  hoped  my  ar- 
tist friend  would  not  question  me  too  closely. 
His  room  had  a  bare  floor  and  gray  walls  and  a 
green  door.  There  was  a  long,  low  bookcase,  and 
a  straight-legged  table,  on  which  stood,  ranged 
against  the  wall,  a  blue  and  white  jar,  a  gold 
Buddha,  and  a  jade  bottle.  On  one  wall  hung  a 
gray  silk  poke  -  bonnet,  of  the  fashion  of  the 
year  1830,  and  on  another  an  empty  gold  frame. 
With  the  exception  of  three  chairs  there  was 
nothing  else  in  the  room.     I  moved  slightly,  and 

'4 


2i6  ABOUT   PARIS 

with  the  nervous  fear  that  if  I  disturbed  or  disar- 
ranged anything  the  bare  gray  walls  might  fall 
in  on  me.  And  then  I  asked  him  why  he  did 
not  put  a  picture  in  his  frame. 

"  Ah,  exactly  !"  he  exclaimed,  triumphantly  ; 
"  that  shows  exactly  what  you  are  ;  you  are  an 
American  philistinc.  You  cannot  see  that  a  pict- 
ure is  a  beautiful  thing  in  itself,  and  that  a  dead- 
gold  frame  with  its  four  straight  lines  is  beauti- 
ful also;  but  together  they  might  not  be  beautiful. 
That  gray  wall  needs  a  spot  on  it,  and  so  I  hung 
that  gold  frame  there,  not  because  it  was  a  frame, 
but  because  it  was  beautiful  ;  for  the  same  rea- 
son I  hung  that  eighteen-thirty  bonnet  on  the 
other  wall.  The  two  grays  harmonize.  People 
do  not  generally  hang  bonnets  on  walls,  but  that 
is  because  they  regard  them  as  things  of  use,  and 
not  as  things  of  beauty." 

I  pointed  with  my  stick  at  the  three  lonely 
ornaments  on  the  solitary  table.  "  Then  if  you 
were  to  put  the  blue  and  white  jar  on  the  right 
of  the  Buddha,  instead  of  on  the  left,"  I  asked, 
"  the  whole  room  would  feel  the  shock  ?" 

"  Of  course,"  answered  my  friend.  "  Can't 
even  you  see  that  ?" 

I  tried  to  see  it,  but  I  could  not.  I  had  only 
just  arrived  in  Paris. 


AMERICANS   IN    PARIS  211 

There  was  another  artist  with  a  studio  across 
the  bridges,  and  his  love  of  art  cost  him  much 
money  and  some  severe  trials.  His  suite  of 
rooms  was  all  in  blue,  gray,  white,  and  black. 
He  said  that  if  you  looked  at  things  in  the 
world  properly,  you  would  see  that  they  were 
all  gray,  blue,  or  black.  He  had  painted  a  gray 
lady  in  a  gray  dress,  with  a  blue  parrot  on  her 
shoulder.  She  had  brown  lips  and  grayish  teeth. 
He  was  very  much  disappointed  in  me  when  I 
told  him  that  lips  always  looked  to  me  either 
pink  or  red.  He  explained  by  saying  that  my 
eyes  were  not  trained  properly.  I  resented  this, 
and  told  him  that  my  eyes  were  as  good  as  his 
own,  and  that  a  recruiting  ofificer  had  once  tested 
them  with  colored  yarns  and  letters  of  the  alpha- 
bet held  up  in  inaccessible  corners,  and  had  given 
me  a  higher  mark  for  eyesight  than  for  anything 
else.  He  said  it  was  not  a  question  of  colored 
yarns ;  and  that  while  I  might  satisfy  a  recruit- 
ing sergeant  that  I  could  distinguish  an  ammuni- 
tion train  from  a  travelling  circus,  it  did  not  ren- 
der me  a  critic  on  art  matters.  He  pointed  out 
that  the  eyes  of  the  women  in  the  Caucasus  who 
make  rugs  are  trained  to  distinguish  a  hundred 
and  eighty  different  shades  of  colors  that  other 
eyes  cannot  see ;  and  in  time,  he  added,  I  would 


212  ABOUT    PARIS 

see  that  everything  in  real  life  looked  flat  and 
gray.  I  took  a  red  carnation  out  of  my  coat, 
and  put  it  over  the  gray  lady's  lips,  and  asked 
him  whether  he  would  call  it  gray  or  red,  and  he 
said  that  was  no  argument. 

He  suffered  a  great  deal  in  his  efforts  to  live 
up  to  his  ideas,  but  assured  me  that  he  was  much 
happier  than  I  in  my  ignorance  of  what  was  beau- 
tiful. He  explained,  for  instance,  that  he  would 
like  to  put  up  some  of  the  photographs  of  his 
family  that  he  had  brought  with  him  around  his 
room,  but  that  he  could  not  do  it,  because  pho- 
tographs were  so  undecorative.  So  he  kept  them 
in  his  trunk.  He  also  kept  a  green  cage  full  of 
doves  because  they  were  gray  and  white  and 
decorative,  and  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  they 
were  a  nuisance,  and  always  flying  away,  and 
being  caught  again  by  small  boys,  who  brought 
them  back,  and  wanted  a  franc  for  so  doing.  He 
suffered,  too,  in  his  inability  to  find  the  shade  of 
blue  for  his  chair  covers  that  would  harmonize 
with  the  rest  of  his  room.  He  covered  the  furni- 
ture five  times,  and  never  successfully,  and  hence 
the  cushions  of  his  lounge  and  stiff  chairs  were 
still  as  white  as  when  they  had  last  gone  to  the 
upholsterer's. 

These  young  men  are  friends  of  mine,  and  I 


AMERICANS    IN    PARIS  213 

am  sure  they  will  not  object  to  my  describing 
their  ateliers,  of  which  they  were  very  proud. 
They  believed  in  their  own  schools,  and  in  their 
own  ways  of  looking  at  art,  and  no  one  could 
laugh  or  argue  them  out  of  it  ;  consequently 
they  deserved  credit  for  the  faith  that  was  in 
them.  They  are  chiefly  interesting  here  as 
showing  how  a  young  man  will  develop  in  the 
artistic  atmosphere  of  Paris.  It  is  only  when  he 
ceases  to  develop,  and  sinks  into  the  easy  leth- 
argy of  a  life  of  pleasure  there,  that  he  becomes 
uninteresting. 

There  was  still  another  young  man  whom  I 
knew  there  who  can  serve  here  now  as  an  ex- 
ample of  the  American  who  stops  in  Paris  too 
long. 

I  first  met  this  artist  at  a  garden-party,  and  he 
asked  me  if  I  did  not  think  it  dull,  and  took  me 
for  a  walk  up  to  Montmartre,  talking  all  the  way 
of  what  a  great  and  beautiful  mother  Paris  was 
to  those  who  worked  there.  His  home  was  in 
Maine,  and  he  let  me  know,  without  reflecting 
on  his  native  town,  that  he  had  been  choked 
and  cramped  there,  and  that  his  life  had  been 
the  life  of  a  Siberian  exile.  Here  he  found  peo- 
ple who  could  understand  ;  here,  the  very  statues 
and  buildings  save  him  advice  and  encouraire- 


214  ABOUT   PARIS 

ment ;  here  were  people  who  took  him  and  his 
work  seriously,  and  who  helped  him  on  to  fresh 
endeavors,  and  who  made  work  a  delight. 

"  I  have  one  picture  in  the  Salon,"  he  said, 
flushing  with  proper  pride  and  pleasure,  "  and 
one  has  just  gone  to  the  World's  Fair,  and  an- 
other has  received  an  honorable  mention  at 
Munich.  That's  pretty  good  for  my  first  year, 
is  it  not  ?  And  I'm  only  twenty-five  years  old 
now,"  he  added,  with  his  eyes  smiling  into  the 
future  at  the  great  things  he  was  to  do.  No- 
body could  resist  the  contagion  of  his  enthusi- 
asm and  earnestness  of  purpose. 

He  was  painting  the  portrait  of  some  rich 
man's  daughter  at  the  time,  and  her  family  took 
a  patronizing  interest  in  him,  and  said  it  was  a 
pity  that  he  did  not  go  out  more  into  society 
and  get  commissions.  They  asked  me  to  tell 
him  to  be  more  careful  about  his  dress,  and  to 
suggest  to  him  not  to  wear  a  high  hat  with  a 
sack-coat.  I  told  them  to  leave  him  alone,  and 
not  to  worry  about  his  clothes,  or  to  suggest  his 
running  after  people  who  had  pretty  daughters 
and  money  enough  to  have  them  painted.  These 
people  would  run  after  him  soon  enough,  if  he 
went  on  as  he  had  begun. 

When  I  saw  him  on  the  boulevards  the  next 


"'I   HAVE   ONE   PICTURE   IN   THE   SALON ' " 


AMERICANS    IN    PARIS  217 

summer  he  had  to  reintroduce  himself ;  he  was 
very  smartly  dressed,  in  a  cheap  way,  and  he 
was  sipping  silly  little  sweet  juices  in  front  of  a 
cafe.  He  was  flushed  and  nervous  and  tired 
looking,  and  rattled  off  a  list  of  the  fashionable 
people  who  were  then  in  Paris  as  correctly  as  a 
Galignani  reporter  could  have  done  it. 

"  How's  art  ?"  I  asked. 

"  Oh,  very  well,"  he  replied.  "  I  had  a  picture 
in  the  Salon  last  year,  and  another  was  com- 
mended at  Munich,  and  I  had  another  one  at 
the  Fair.  That's  pretty  good  for  my  first  two 
years  abroad,  isn't  it?" 

The  next  year  I  saw  him  several  times  with 
various  young  women  in  the  court-yard  of  the 
Grand  Hotel,  than  which  there  is  probably  no 
place  in  all  Paris  less  Parisian.  They  seemed  to 
be  models  in  street  dress,  and  were  as  easy  to 
distinguish  as  a  naval  officer  in  citizen's  clothes. 
He  stopped  me  once  again  before  I  left  Paris, 
and  invited  me  to  his  studio  to  breakfast.  I 
asked  him  what  he  had  to  show  me  there. 

"  I  have  three  pictures,"  he  said,  "  that  I  did 
the  first  six  months  I  was  here  ;  they — " 

"Yes,  I  know,"  I  interrupted.  "One  was  at  last 
year's  Salon,  and  one  at  the  World's  Fair,  and  the 
other  took  a  prize  at  Munich.     Is  that  all  ?" 


2l8  ABOUT   PARIS 

He  flushed  a  little,  and  laughed,  and  said, 
"  Yes,  that  is  all." 

"  Do  you  get  much  inspiration  here?"  I  asked, 
pointing  to  the  colored  fountain  and  the  piles  of 
luggage  and  the  ugly  glass  roof. 

"  I  don't  understand  you,"  he  said. 

He  put  the  card  he  had  held  out  to  me  back 
in  his  case,  and  bowed  grandly,  and  walked 
back  to  the  girl  he  had  left  at  one  of  the  tables, 
and  on  my  way  out  from  the  offices  I  saw  him 
frowning  into  a  glass  before  him.  The  girl  was 
pulling  him  by  the  sleeve,  but  he  apparently 
was  not  listening. 

The  American  artist  who  has  taken  Paris  prop- 
erly has  only  kind  words  to  speak  of  her.  He 
is  grateful  for  what  she  gave  him,  but  he  is  not 
unmindful  of  his  mother-country  at  home.  He 
may  complain  when  he  returns  of  the  mud  in 
our  streets,  and  the  height  of  our  seventeen- 
story  buildings,  and  the  ugliness  of  our  elevated 
roads — and  who  does  not  ?  But  if  his  own  art  is 
lasting  and  there  is  in  his  heart  much  constancy, 
his  work  will  grow  and  continue  in  spite  of  these 
things,  and  will  not  droop  from  the  lack  of  at- 
mosphere about  him.  New  York  and  every 
great  city  owns  a  number  of  these  men  who 
have    studied    in   the   French    capital,  and  who 


AMERICANS   IN    PARIS  219 

speak  of  it  as  fondly  as  a  man  speaks  of  his  col- 
lege and  of  the  years  he  spent  there.  They  help 
to  leaven  the  lump  and  to  instruct  others  wiio 
have  not  had  the  chance  that  was  given  them  to 
see  and  to  learn  of  all  these  beautiful  things. 
These  are  the  men  who  made  the  Columbian 
Fair  what  it  was,  who  taught  their  teacher  and 
the  whole  world  a  lesson  in  what  was  possible  in 
architecture  and  in  statuary,  in  decoration  and 
design.  That  was  a  much  better  and  a  much 
finer  thing  for  them  to  have  done  than  to  have 
dragged  on  in  Paris  waiting  for  a  ribbon  or  a 
medal.  They  are  the  best  examples  we  have  of 
the  Americans  who  made  use  of  Paris,  instead  of 
permitting  Paris  to  make  use  of  them.  And  be- 
cause they  did  the  one  thing  and  avoided  the 
other,  they  are  now  helping  and  enlightening 
their  own  people  and  a  whole  nation,  and  not 
selfishly  waiting  in  a  foreign  capital  for  a  place 
on  a  jury  for  themselves. 


THE   END 


UC  SOUTHI  RN  RIGIONAL  I I15HAHY  I ACILITY 


AA    000  922  060    9 


